


The (not very) Mysterious Chunky Traveler

by ChubbyCat14



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Restaurant, Belly Kink, Denial, Embarrassment, Farting, Fat - Freeform, Fluff, Food, Heymans is using a false name, Humiliation, Jean doesn't realize at first, M/M, Ripping Clothes, Smut, Stuffing, Teasing, Unrealistic Weight Gain, Weight Gain, gassy Heymans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-26
Updated: 2020-09-17
Packaged: 2021-03-04 04:21:33
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 23,288
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24927616
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChubbyCat14/pseuds/ChubbyCat14
Summary: Basically Jean works at a restaurant, and he has this new customer which always comes very late and orders a lot of food, making a pig of himself. Bit of a mysterious guy, comes from abroad, (might secretly be his childhood friend who he hasn't seen in years). Expect a lot of messy eating and a rapid weight gain, with maybe some embarrasment and humiliation if I get down to it
Relationships: Heymans Breda/Jean Havoc
Comments: 5
Kudos: 66





	1. A Strange Encounter

Jean Havoc was the owner of a tiny restaurant in town. He was the main and only cook, and sometimes even the waiter – he only had one employee, and her shifts didn’t cover all the customer hours.

He had owned the place for ten years : it was a small yet comfy, and very appreciated by the locals (unlike the tourists, which favored the bigger establishments). Sure, Jean’s cooking wasn’t _stellar_ , but it was pretty good for a quick stop, and his customers usually enjoyed chatting with him. Well, he liked to _chat_ with men, mostly – with ladies it would very often turn into a flirt. He owned a little room upstairs, which he sometimes used for hookups. The rest of the time, it was his bedroom.

It was a simple life, by no means what Jean had dreamed of as a kid. Back then, he had wanted to become a soldier. He was spending a lot of time hunting in the forest with his uncle, which was where he learned to handle a gun. He liked guns quite a bit, though it wasn’t the job’s real appeal for him. He wanted to become popular with the ladies, and to make his family proud by defending the nation.

He had a best friend back then, called Heymans, they had known each other since middle-school. He and Heymans had shared the same dream : they trained together, and promised to always support each other’s dream. Heymans was a bit shorter than Jean, but much more popular back then. He was always calm and composed, and quite mysterious too. Very muscular for a young adult, but always turning down the girls who wanted to date him. Jean always admired him a lot – but Heymans betrayed him on the day of the entrance exam. By all means, he should have failed, but he cheated with the results, and stole Jean’s rightful place among the new recruits. Heymans became a soldier, and Jean became nothing. It was only after a few months of depression that he was picked up by his uncle who taught him how to cook and manage a little business. Jean inherited the restaurant when his uncle died a few years later.

“It could have been worse,” Jean would generally say. “It’s not the job I always dreamed of, but it pays the bills – and besides, my customers are nice. I can’t really complain.”

One day, as Jean was about to close the restaurant after his last clients left, a fat middle-aged man opened his door. He was wearing a dusty jacket and black baggy pants, black boots and sunglasses. He looked very sweaty (perhaps the summer heat was getting to him, or maybe he had run).

“My apologies sir, I’m afraid we’re closed,” Jean said quietly.

“Oh,” the man replied. “I’m sorry,” he mumbled, “but I’m starving, and everything else is closed. Would you mind taking a quick order for me? I’ll eat it quick and be out of your way.”

Jean pondered for a moment. Sure, he could allow it. He didn’t have anything planned for his evening anyway.

“All right, please take a seat then. I’ll bring you the menu.”

Jean disappeared into the kitchen, grabbed a menu from the shelf, and put his apron back on. He also filled a glass of water for his exhausted customer. When he came back into the lounge, the man had sat down, breathing with a sigh of relief. He took off his sunglasses and put them on the table, wiping his forehead with his sleeve.

“Ah, thanks,” he said when Jean put the glass of water on his table. “Honestly I don’t want to bother you sir, you can just boil water and make me some pasta.”

The man had a strange accent, hinting that he wasn’t from this country. He was as mysterious as his attire.

“It’s fine,” Jean said with a smile. “Now that I’m back in my routine, I might as well go all out. Just tell me what you’d like to eat.”

“Are you sure?” The man asked, sounding a little concerned.

“Sure, it’s no problem. In fact, I appreciate you being here: I’ve bought a little too much food this week, thanks to you it won’t go to waste.”

The man’s belly rumbled, and he looked away in shame. Grabbing the menu that he had been given, he began to scan it quickly.

“I could do with a few burgers,” he said after a moment.

“A few?” Jean asked in surprise. “They’re pretty heavy you know.”

“I’ll only take three then,” the man replied without skipping a beat.

 _We’ve got a big eater here,_ Jean thought. _Well, I could have guessed that from his frame._

“Which type of burgers will it be?”

“The ones with a lot of meat,” the man replied bluntly. “Whatever you have left.”

“All right, thank you for being patient, I’ll be back soon.”

Jean went back inside his kitchen once more, and got to work. Truth be told, he was glad the mysterious customer had ordered burgers, since it was his specialty. If he was impressed enough, maybe he’d come back. Gluttons were good for business.

“There,” Jean said with a smile, half an hour later when he was done. “Three generous burgers for mister… what’s your name?”

“Castillo,” the man replied. “Don Castillo.”

_Ah, a Spanish name. That explains the accent._

“I’m Jean, Jean Havoc, this restaurant’s owner. I like to chat with my clients when I’ve got nothing to do, do you mind?”

Don looked a little surprised, and maybe even a little embarrassed for a second (for reasons yet unknown to Jean). He nodded anyway. Jean sat across from him.

“So what’s the reason for your visit?” Jean asked, placing his elbows on the table. “I assume you’re not from here.”

“On a mission,” Don replied between two bites. “Can’t really talk about it.”

“Oh, that’s very intriguing,” Jean said.

For a moment, he was caught a little off guard, and didn’t know what to say. Don was really eating fast, as if he had been starved for days.

“Excuse me, are you quite all right?” He asked, a little worried. “Don’t choke on that,” he added with a nervous chuckle.

“’m fine,” Don replied, taking another huge bite. “Ran a bit,” he explained. “’s why ‘m tired.”

His belly was making little noises as he ate, as if little bits of gas were moving around in his stomach. He was a messy eater, constantly staining the his cheeks with sauce and wiping them with the napkins.

_I guess that’s why he was a little embarrassed when I asked if I could stay to chat, dear lord._ _If I ate like that I’d want to be alone too._

“Well, I’m glad you’re enjoying my cooking, at the very least,” Jean eventually said, unable to find anything better.

“’re welcome.”

Don kept eating without uttering another word, and didn’t slow down until the end: and even then he took the time to lick the crumbs off his fingers and on his plate. Jean had been watching him the whole time, feeling a little fascinated.

_He’s wearing especially large clothes to conceal it, but he’_ _s really really big, now that I see him from up close. Probably obese._

Jean suddenly felt the odd desire to feed him more. Maybe it was the sheer oddity of the sight, but he wanted Don to order some food again. Just to see for how long he could go on like this.

Don was breathing slowly, resting both hands on his belly, which was still rumbling a little. He looked a little out of breath, and maybe a little pained too. He stifled a belch, and got up from his chair.

“Thanks,” he said. “How much do I owe you?”

“You don’t want to eat anything else?” Jean asked stupidly.

“Nah, I’m good,” Don replied.

But it seemed obvious to Jean he was still hungry.

“Remember that I don’t mind, I still have some leftover food to get rid of.”

Don looked extremely tempted, but something seemed to convince him not to take the bait. He really seemed to be in pain, his moves were a little rigid. He paid what he owed with an extra, and left the restaurant, closing the door behind himself.

“Well then,” Jean said, finding himself alone again. “That’s a sight you don’t see every day.”

_Why do I get this weird sense of familiarity coming from this stranger?_


	2. Stuffing gone too far

Jean didn’t see Don for a few days after that. He liked to stroll in the village and countryside during his free time, he’d often look at the people surrounding him, perhaps hoping to find a strange man in all black and wearing sunglasses – but he never did. After a week, Jean guessed that the stranger had only been passing through, and that they would never meet again. Somehow, that made him feel a little melancholic, as if he had somehow missed a great occasion – but a great occasion for what, he was unsure.

_I’m probably just sad for my business, that guy would have been a_ _wonderful_ _client._

And yet two weeks later, out of _nowhere_ , Don suddenly reappeared. He was one of the first clients to come in as Jean opened the restaurant in the morning. This time he was wearing a white shirt and blue shorts, much more typical for the season. The sunglasses were still there, though.

“Good morning sir,” Jean said cheerfully as he came to take his order. “Are you here to have breakfast?”

“Yep. I’ll take the honey waffles with extra whipping cream and strawberries, a little box of donuts and a glass of fresh milk. Oh, and maybe a slice of apple pie too.”

Jean’s smile widened ever so slightly.

“Of course, I’ll bring everything to you in just a moment.”

_So he’s still as much of a glutton, that one._

For some reason, Jean felt really happy about that. He hoped he could spare a little moment to have a chat with Don, perhaps hear about where he had been the last two weeks, and what his plans were for the future.

Jean took care of his other orders first (a hot chocolate and a coffee), then brought Don his tray.

“There you go sir! It’s nice to see you again.”

“Hm? Is it?” Don asked curiously. “Why is that?”

_Hm, indeed, why is that? How do I justify feeling happy about seeing a_ _near-_ _stranger again?_

“You’re a good customer,” Jean replied, gesturing toward the tray.

Don blushed a little.

“It’s not that much food,” he mumbled. “Besides they say that you have to eat a lot for breakfast, right?”

“It’s true, they do! I hope you enjoy it.”

Jean went back to talking with his other clients. There was miss Grant, an old woman who lived right across from his shop, a famous mystery novelist who came to eat at his place nearly every day (Jean had a special table just for her). Sometimes she would even come with her cats. She was having breakfast with a friend (miss Wheels, Jean recalled), a school teacher and a bit of a paranoid. She was extremely fond of conspiracy theories and reported alien sightings nearly every week. The villagers loved to make fun of her, though they liked her a lot too.

“Good day to you two,” Jean said with his usual charming smile. “What are we discussing today?”

“It’s wizards this time, apparently,” miss Grant replied amiably. “Apparently they are kidnapping children, or something like that.”

Despite being friends, miss Grant loved making fun of miss Wheel’s gullible nature. So did Jean.

“It’s very serious, I tell you!” Miss Wheels replied in frustration. “Paul was just telling me the other day that he saw strange people wearing robes, walking on the Elder bridge!”

“Dear me, the village is no longer safe,” miss Grant said with a faux-frightened expression.

She and Jean laughed together, and Jean came back into his kitchen to check on his supplies. He came out ten minutes later, curious to see how Don was doing. The man seemed to be taking his time with his food: he was not nearly as messy and voracious as he had been before.

“So what brings you to our small corner of the world?” Jean asked amiably. “Are you here on holidays?”

It apparently took Don a while to realize he was being addressed.

“Oh, nothing of the sort. I’m on duty actually.”

“What kind of duty?”

“Detective work, if you must know. I’ll be staying for a few weeks.”

“Well I sure hope I’ll be seeing you some more then! What kind of detective work?”

“I’m not supposed to say.”

He frowned.

“I wasn’t even supposed to tell you I was on duty.”

“Oops,” Jean replied with a shrug. “Well y’know, I’ll just have to pretend I didn’t hear anything!”

“Please do.”

Jean decided to leave Don alone for the time being, but he was curious about this ‘detective work’, whatever it may be. The village was always (and had always been) relatively peaceful, so why would a detective need to spend several weeks investigating a case? And what kind of case would it be?

The following evening, Don was back at the restaurant – once again it was very late, and all the clients had already left. But Jean had purposefully kept his door open, prepared for this eventuality. Why he cared so much about Don eating at his place, he still didn’t really know.

“Apologies,” Don said as he came in, “are you still open?”

“Barely,” Jean replied.

“Damn,” Don complained.

He looked a little nervous somehow, he was sweating and breathing a little hard. It was a warm summer night, the insects were buzzing in all directions.

“Is it okay if I… stay anyway?” He mumbled. “No, wait, forget I ever ask.”

“You can stay,” Jean said, “if you tell me what it is you’re investigating.”

Don narrowed his eyes.

“Eh? You want to know that bad?”

“Call it natural curiosity.”

Don placed a hand on his protruding gut. It seemed he really badly wanted to say no, but couldn’t bring himself to.

“Fine. But I’m real fuckin’ hungry, so it’d better be a whole lot of food.”

“Yessir!” Jean replied, mimicking the military salute.

He went back inside his kitchen to fetch the menu, and brought it to the hungry man.

“So what will it be?”

“Hm… I’ll take the plate of vegetables,” Don said, sounding unsure.

“Okay,” Jean said, writing it down on his notepad. “And?”

“Uh… well, the spaghetti plate, I suppose. And maybe some burgers too,” he added in a very quiet voice, as if part of him hoped Jean wouldn’t hear his last request.

“All right!” Jean said. “Please be patient, I’ll get to work.”

“Actually,” Don said, “I might as well help you, right? I know it’s not exactly ordinary, but like… if you’re going to do this for me, I’m not going to sit around and wait.”

“Oh,” Jean said. “Yeah sure, why not!”

They walked into the kitchen together. It was a bit of an unusual situation, but Jean didn’t mind – it was like hiring a co-worker, in a way. He gave Don an apron to wear above his clothes (suddenly noticing that he was no longer wearing the shirt and shorts from this morning, but a black and thick attire akin to a military uniform). They began by chopping the vegetables.

“So?” Jean asked. “That mysterious mission you have, what is it?”

“Mysterious mission,” Don echoed, apparently lost in thoughts. “Hm. Don’t tell anyone, we don’t want to cause a panic.”

“We?”

“Me and my superiors. Back on topic, I have been sent here because there have been multiple reports to the local police of illegal uses of alchemy. I’m here to investigate whether there’s actually something big going on, or it’s just a few kids playing pranks and needing to be scolded.”

“Illegal alchemy? That’s strange, I never heard of anything like that,” Jean commented. “Not many alchemists in the countryside, you see.”

“Not many _official_ ones, no,” Don corrected. “But many individuals born with a little talent and who don’t know how to use it properly. It leads to a lot of accidents, but it’s usually pretty easy to keep them in line.”

“Really?”

“It’s more common than you’d think. I’ve had to deal with plenty in my career.”

“Huh. Makes me think there should be some kind of system to keep these kids from hurting themselves. Like… a school system of some sort?”

“Could be. It’d make my job a lot easier for sure.”

They were quickly done with the vegetables, which Jean began to fry. Don seemed a little restless, as if he couldn’t wait to eat them. Jean gave him an apple in the meantime, which Don ate pretty quickly. And then he ate another, and a third one. Then he forced himself to stop, but it seemed really difficult for him.

“How come you’re so hungry anyway? Done some exercise?”

For some reason that made Don blush a little again.

“Yeah. My job requires that I keep in shape, so I exercise every evening. That’s why I’m so hungry.”

 _Even when I exercise I don’t need to eat as much as you do buddy,_ Jean thought, smiling to himself.

Not that he cared, really. It was a little cute, the excuses Don provided to justify his gluttony.

They chatted for a little longer. When the food was ready, they brought it to the lounge together, and both sat at the nearest table. Once more, Don began to eat with reckless abandon, attacking the burgers like he had a personal grudge against them. The spaghetti went down in a flash, and it was only when he got to the veggie plate that the detective finally began to slow down a little.

“Oomph,” Don said, patting his now very bloated belly. “That was nice.”

He seemed to be trying really hard to not let out a burp. Jean was gazing at him curiously.

“You want to eat something else?”

“I, uh...”

Don avoided Jean’s gaze.

“I shouldn’t really,” he mumbled. “My superiors say I should watch my calorie intake.”

“I won’t tell anyone,” Jean replied with a toothy grin. “Those lips are sealed!”

“Hm.”

“Besides, remember that it’s for a good cause. You’re preventing me from wasting any food.”

“All right, if it’s for a good cause,” Don said, perhaps a little too quickly. “But I’m only doing this for you, okay? I’m not hungry anymore.”

“Thank you very much then!” Jean replied, raising both his thumbs at his… was it his client of his guest at this point? Who knew. “It will be more burgers I assume?”

“Yes please, I really like them.”

“How many?”

“Uh… four.”

Jean tried to conceal his surprise, but Don seemed to notice it.

“I mean, is it too little? I know you want to finish the stocks, but I don’t have much room left. Well, I guess I could manage five or six, if I push a bit.”

“Six it is then!” Jean said, this time doing a much better job at concealing his shock.

He went to the kitchen as Don went to the bathroom, and began to work.

_God, he’s completely insane. Do I even have enough to make him six burgers?_

Jean checked his stock. In fact, he did (he even had enough to make seven burgers). But that meant he’d have to restock pretty quickly if he didn’t want to run out.

_Should I make seven burgers for him? Am I going to manage to make him eat seven extra burgers?_

This was ridiculous, and yet Jean wanted to try.

_If he doesn’t want it, I can always have it._

An hour later, Jean was done cooking his seven burgers, and Don had visited the bathroom on six occasions. He had removed his heavy dark vest, revealing a white tank top underneath. It was the first time Jean saw him wearing something that wasn’t needlessly baggy – in fact the tank top stuck closely to his frame, and didn’t quite cover his belly completely.

_Holy hell, this man is huge! He’s pretty good at hiding it, but there’s definitely at least 200 kilos in there. Hot damn._

“You got the food?” Don asked stupidly, in a tone that sounded a lot like he was begging.

“Of course. Here, enjoy yourself.”

Don ate a little more slowly this time, careful to not stain his clothes or himself. His belly was making a symphony of little noises, from moving gas to loud rumbles, and it seemed to embarrass him greatly. The more he ate, the tighter his shirt looked, riding slightly above his belly button. He seemed to be in a lot of pain by the time he reached the third burger, but he kept eating, despite obviously hurting himself.

“I’m just doing this for you,” he kept repeating. “I don’t eat as much usually. I’m on a diet.”

“You don’t have to force yourself-” Jean began.

“No no it’s fine, I can finish it,” Don cut in quickly. “Besides, a promise is a promise.”

The sixth burger had him practically moaning in pain. Jean didn’t know if it was exciting to watch, or utterly painful.

“Are you okay?” He eventually asked.

“’m fine,” Don said, trying to force himself to chew the last bite.

He began to slowly massage his own aching belly, where his bloated stomach made his skin tighten. His teeth were clenched and he was sweating.

“Bathroom,” he said.

He tried to get up but accidentally bumped his belly against the table, and moaned in pain. He let out a fart, which seemed to embarrass him more than anything he had done up until his arrival.

“Sorry,” he said, red as a tomato, hiding his face with one hand. “Gnnh.”

Jean helped him move all the way to the bathroom, ignoring the farts which were getting more frequent, and even helped him sit on the toilet. He then left, closed the door behind himself, and went to open all the windows. Sadly the bathroom wasn’t sound-proof, and he could hear everything.

After what seemed like an eternity, Don finally came out, smelling of fresh soap (and sweat).

“I’m so sorry you had to see this,” he said, still a little red. “My stomach doesn’t handle junk food all that well. I… I should better go.”

“But,” Jean said, “you didn’t finish your last burger.”

In that one instant, Jean could see the conflict on Don’s face. The intense pain and embarrassment on the one hand, completely crushed by the ultimate desire to eat more delicious food on the other one. Don was obviously a true pig if he was ready to put aside his own pride and personal comfort just to eat some more.

_And for some reason that’s very hot. Good thing I’m wearing an apron._

“Okay,” Don said, sitting back on the chair very slowly. “Just that one and then I’ll go.”

“You want me to help you?” Jean asked before he could stop himself.

“Eh? How so?”

“Uh… nevermind. Enjoy.”

Don picked up the burger, and took a bite. He seemed to have recovered from most of his stomach pain by that point: though he didn’t eat it very fast, he didn’t seem to suffer as he ate the seventh burger.

_He hasn’t even realized it was more than his order, has he?_

“Well it warms my heart that you enjoy my food, at any rate,” Jean said with an honest smile.

“Mph,” Don said, looking away. “You’re welcome.”

Getting up looked a little painful, but he managed to walk toward the exit no problem, grabbing his bag and coat.

“I’ll pay you an extra for the, uh...”

He blushed again, furiously.

“The what?” Jean asked, willing to make him say it.

“The gas,” Don muttered quietly. “And you don’t tell anyone what you saw, got it?”

He looked incredibly nervous and uncomfortable, so Jean patted him on the shoulder reassuringly.

“All right, I promise. But that’s fine, you know? I sincerely don’t mind. You can come back here anytime.”

Once again, the conflict was visible on Don’s face: the obvious fear of embarrassing himself again versus the prospect of eating more delicious food.

“I wish you didn’t encourage me to overeat” he said with a sigh. “I told you already, I’m on a diet. I don’t think I’m that big personally, but my superiors think I should lose some weight.”

_He doesn’t think he’s that big? Huh._

“Fine, but a burger every now and then hasn’t hurt anyone,” Jean replied innocently.

“Really?”

“Sure, don’t worry! You said you exercised, right? That means you deserved your treat. Don’t worry about gaining weight, if you keep working out you’ll lose the gut in no time.”

“That’d be nice,” Don said dreamily. “I was quite handsome when I was younger.”

Jean frowned, seeming to recall something. But Don was already waving goodbye, thanking him for his kindness. Jean cast his thoughts aside and wished him a good night.

_Could it be one big coincidence?_ _No, it couldn’t possibly be him. They don’t even look all that similar._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So what did you think? If you have anything to say don't hesitate to leave a comment. If you have any suggestions, I might take a few, depending on how much I like 'em.


	3. Strange case of denial at the grocery store

The next day, Jean woke up with a headache. He rolled out of bed, splashed some water on his face, then smoked a cigarette as he gazed through the window. The village looked as peaceful as ever. There was even a little kid selling lemonade in the street.

“In this heat?” Jean muttered to himself. “Good luck on not dying, kid.”

He went down the stairs, planning to open the restaurant, and then remembered that he needed to do some errands first. Recalling last night’s events made him smile.

_I really hope he comes back, I want him to taste my other recipes._

As he left the restaurant with his bag and purse, he noticed miss Grant standing across the street.

“You’re not open today?” She asked curiously. “Have the wizards stolen your business too?”

“The wizards?” Jean repeated with a frown, having forgotten all about yesterday’s discussion.

“You know, miss Wheel’s latest obsession,” the old woman explained.

“Oh right,” Jean said, suddenly remembering. “I’ll watch our for any abductions then!”

He waved and left. He bought a glass of lemonade from the kid (who was apparently immune to the heat – perhaps he had grown up in the desert or something?), and went inside the grocery store.

Jean knew almost everyone in the village – as such he tended to strike conversations with nearly all the people he met.

“Yo there Kain, how’s it going?”

Kain fuery was a young bespectacled man with dark hair and fair skin – he worked as the local journalist. He was always moving around, asking people about very random things. Jean bought his newspaper every now and then – since Fuery didn’t have much to report, he tended to fill it with nice things like “Very cute cat sighted near the Elder Bridge, looking for owner” or “Result of the contest for the prettiest poppy on the poppy hill have arrived, and you’ll definitely be surprised!”. He’d also publish miss Grant’s writings every now and then, which were the main reason his business was popular at all. He was a good kid, all in all. Jean liked him.

“Very good, Jean!” the young man replied. “A lot of strange things have happened lately and people are concerned, so I’m on the case! Have you heard or seen anything strange lately?”

Jean thought about Don – he was definitely a strange man, but he was probably not what Kain wanted to write about.

“No, not really. What kinda stuff have people seen?”

“Strange people wearing robes, I heard,” Kain summarized. “Also mister Degard found some odd ruins on the poppy hills, he’s asked me to come see later in the afternoon, I’m quite curious about them!”

“Well I hope you have fun with that, then,” Jean said with a smile.

He left the journalist to his work, and began to look through the shelves for the supplies he needed.

_Wizards and strange ruins now? It sounds like Don may actually be onto something, huh._

Speaking of Don, there he was, doing his errands. He was shoving a lot of food in his basket, which already looked quite heavy.

_He may be fat, but he’s definitely got some muscle in there too. Guess he wasn’t lying about the exercise._

“Hey Don, how’s it shaking?”

Don turned his head around, lazily.

“Oh, it’s you. I guess I’m okay. How about you?”

“Oh, I’m good. What’s all the food for? You’ll use it to bait the wizards?”

“What wizards?” Don asked curiously. “But no, the food is for me, obviously. I can’t eat at your restaurant every day.”

“I wouldn’t mind.”

“I like to eat alone sometimes,” Don replied, sounding a little distant.

“So that no one can hear the noise?”

Don frowned. It seemed to take him a while to understand what Jean meant. When he finally connected the dots, his cheeks flushed red.

“How dare you,” he said very quietly. “I hope you didn’t tell anyone!”

“Of course not, why would I want to spread gossip like that? Chill.”

“All right, sorry. I’m just… very sorry about what happened yesterday, that’s all.”

“No need to be, you helped me greatly! I’m always glad to have a big eater around, when I have to finish the stocks.”

“Big eater?” Don echoed uneasily.

“Well, you did eat a lot,” Jean said neutrally.

“I did.”

There was a brief moment of silence. Don seemed bothered by something.

“I’d like you to know that I’m not fat,” he said after a while.

“Ah?”

“It’s just my clothes that make me look big, but I’m not a fat man. I’m just a little soft around the edges. Yesterday I only ate so much because I wanted to help you finish the stocks, and because I had done some exercise.”

“I see.”

“It’s very common for middle-aged men to gain a little weight I’ve been told, I have nothing to worry about.”

“Of course.”

“Some kid called me fat this morning,” Don admitted, sounding really dejected all of a sudden.

“Kids can be cruel. I guess you _look_ a little big.”

“I’m just a little bloated because I ate a lot for breakfast this morning,” Don said defensively. “Which I usually don’t by the way.”

“You’re really worried about this issue, aren’t you?”

“Not especially,” Don lied, very poorly.

“Okay, hold on, let me help you there,” Jean said with a smile.

He placed himself right in front of Don, who seemed unsure about what he was supposed to do. Jean raised his hands in front of his face.

“May I?” He asked.

“May you what?”

“Test it out. See if you’re fat or not.”

“Oh, uh… I guess it’s fine. I’m not very fat anyway. Just a little soft.”

Jean dug his fingers in Don’s soft flesh, testing its resistance. He did seem a little bloated, but was otherwise very soft all over. It was like digging into a pillow, but more firm. Jean could almost feel the hair underneath.

“You’re not that big,” he lied after his inspection. “Suck it in a little?”

Don did as he was told. Sucking in his gut seemed to take a lot of effort out of him. Jean gazed at him for a bit.

“Yeah, you look almost slim that way! Really, if you had sucked it in when you came to visit me the first time, I wouldn’t even have noticed you were a little chunky. You can lose all the weight in no time.”

“You really think so?” Don asked, sounding very hopeful.

“Of course! You know, last year I kinda let myself go, and I looked a lot like you do now. But it didn’t take me long to get rid of it all, and now I look perfectly slim!”

“You’re still a little round around the belly button,” Don said, to Jean’s astonishment. “But I guess you did a good job on that workout.”

He picked up his bags.

“Well if you’ll excuse me...”

And he left to pay for his food. Jean was still a little dumbfounded.

_He thinks I’m round? Me? I would be offended if it weren’t so hilarious._

If there ever was a man so deeply coated in denial, Jean had yet to meet him. Smiling to himself, he went back to his errands. He needed to buy quite a lot of food, just in case Don came back to have dinner at his place again.


	4. A friendly picnic

The following weeks were reasonably peaceful for Jean. He would see Don very often, eating at his restaurant – usually for breakfast or lunch (though the man never dared to come back for dinner, probably because he was still too embarrassed about last time he had done that). Both men enjoyed each other’s company quite a lot, and would often hang out in the village or nearby woods. With each passing day, Jean became more certain of Don’s true identity. The Spanish accent could be easily explained, maybe the man had spent a while abroad. Still, something bothered Jean – if it really was his childhood friend Heymans, why did he feel the need to hide his identity? It didn’t make any sense. Could it be related to his job? But even so, who did he hope to fool? It hardly made any sense.

Simultaneously, the mysterious wizards were at work, in mysterious ways. They rarely appeared during the day, but they often came to pillage the houses at night. Jean saw them once, wearing masks and strange robes with odd designs on the fabric. They hid in the nearby mountains, but they always managed to flee before the police could catch them.

“My investigation determined that we’re facing a large cult organization,” Don said one day. “I managed to catch a few of the members, but they keep multiplying somehow. It’s one of the strangest cases I’ve ever had to deal with.”

Though whatever it was the cultists were doing, it was completely irrelevant to Jean’s existence. He considered them as some form of background noise, and not much else. More importantly (to him anyway), Don was getting fatter, little by little.

It was a bit hard to keep track of the expansion of his waistline, because of all the efforts Don pulled to hide it. He kept buying larger and baggier clothes to hide his belly from the rest of the world. When Jean would bring up the topic, he’d always have an excuse ready. “I’m not getting fatter, I’m just bloated because I ate some cheese. I always tend to bloat when I eat dairy products.” “It’s because I’m sitting, we always look bigger when we sit.”

Once, he even claimed that his weight gain was an “optical illusion”, and had the audacity to pretend he had actually _lost_ weight over the course of the last few weeks. He would often compare his belly to Jean’s, saying they were not very different from one another.

Now, Jean wasn’t exactly slim himself. He had a little fat roll around his belly button, which he liked to call the ‘chef roll’. “A skinny chef is a chef who makes bad food”, his uncle always told him: he had to maintain a tiny bit of pudge so that his clients would know he was actually good at what he was doing. It was simple common sense. Of course, no one but Don would compare Jean’s chef roll with Don’s protruding gut, because the size difference made the comparison ridiculous. Still, Jean thought it was a little cute, so he humored Don and played along.

One day, Don came to Jean’s restaurant on his day off. Since it was also where Jean lived, he came down to open the door for his friend.

“I have a little bit of investigation to do in the mountains,” he explained when Jean asked what brought him there. “But it shouldn’t take too long, and it’s actually a rather nice place. Do you want to come along? I thought we could have a little picnic.”

“Investigation and picnic sounds fun. You want me to help with the food?”

“Yes please.”

Jean knew Don’s tastes very well by now. He made him three enormous tuna sandwiches, a salad, and loaded the backpack with two large soda bottles.

“Sheesh, the bag’s heavy. I’m glad I won’t be the one carrying it. You sure you’ll be okay?”

“Yeah, I’m used to it,” Don replied casually. “Let’s go.”

The stroll up the mountain was nice and comfortable. Jean expected Don to fall behind quickly, but he ended up being the tired one. Once more, he was shocked to find out that all the fat on Don’s body hid a lot of muscles. It was honestly a little impressive, and very sexy.

“What will you be investigating anyway?”

“A set of statues in a cave,” Don explained.

“Eh? Why do you need to do that?”

“It’ll help me a lot identifying what kind of cult we’re dealing with here. If I want to stop them before they gain too much power, it’s better to understand how their inner system works.”

“Oh. Makes sense,” Jean replied, though he didn’t really understand anything.

Said statues had very elegant designs. They hadn’t been carved from stone, but artificially erected using alchemy. They didn’t represent people, but odd shapes, with a lot of strange symbols carved on the surface. Don spent a while comparing them with a set of references he had in a book, then took some photos. Further in the cave they found some odd paintings (representing a lot of eyes, which was honestly a little creepy). Don took more pictures, more notes, and they were done. They went back into the forest, found a nice clearing near the river, and sat on tree stumps for their picnic.

“God I’m starving,” Jean said.

“Same,” Don admitted. “The heat always makes me hungry.”

“Odd. For most people it’s the cold.”

Don didn’t bother replying, and began to eat his first sandwich. Jean watched him eat, pretending to gaze at the trees and flowers whenever Don would look at him.

_He can say whatever he likes, his gut has definitely grown since we met. And it’s no wonder, with all he eats. His stomach better be made of steel._

Once he was done eating, Don opened his vest, and began to massage his belly. That was something he liked to do, but only in front of Jean and never in public. That was because his shirts tended to be tight, unlike his dark vest.

“Hmph, that was delicious,” he said, stifling a belch. “Thanks bud.”

“You’re welcome. I hope that was enough?”

“Sure, sure, don’t worry.”

He turned his head toward Jean, looking a little worried all of a second.

“Uh, it wasn’t too fat, right? Those sandwiches, it follows the diet restrictions I gave you?”

“Of course they do,” Jean lied.

Don’s doctor had given him specific instructions regarding what he was supposed to eat, but Don was absolutely _terrible_ at following them. He had given Jean a copy of the list, but Jean had never even read it. He didn’t think Don would be very happy if he _actually_ followed the restrictions.

“Say, I have an idea,” Jean suddenly said. “How about we go swimming for a bit?”

“Swimming?” Don echoed, sounding uncertain. “We haven’t brought bathing suits.”

“Who cares, we’ll just do it in our underwear! C’mon, the river is right here, it will be fun!”

“It’s not recommended to go in the water while you’re still digesting,” Don argued desperately.

“I’m pretty sure that’s a myth.”

Don still didn’t look very happy about the idea.

“C’mon, if you agree to swim with me I’ll make you an extra-large pizza for tonight! Maybe even two.”

“Oh, I guess it couldn’t hurt,” Don said very suddenly.

 _Too easy,_ Jean thought, amused.

In truth, he didn’t like swimming all that much. The water was going to be cold, and the bottom of the river full of mud. But if it meant he could see Don in his underwear, it was definitely worth the trouble.

Jean gave the example by quickly removing his clothes. It was such a hot day that he didn’t really mind anyway. Looking at himself in the water’s reflection, he noticed that his ‘chef roll’ had grown a bit larger lately.

 _Don is having a terrible influence on me,_ he thought with an inner chuckle.

As he began to walk into the river, he turned around to see how Don was doing. He had already removed his vest, which he was carefully folding and placing on the tree stump. Jean was already in love with the way his striped shirt clung to his belly tightly, showing the outline of his gigantic moobs and digging through his belly button. But eventually the shirt went away too, folded like the rest, and Jean realized his midsection was swelling noticeably. He quickly turned around and walked further into the river, ignoring the cold, and only stopped when the water level reached his belly button. When he turned around once more, Don was wearing nothing but a bright red speedo, which looked a little small for him.

_Oh my god he’s huge._

Don was blushing, and Jean found himself reddening too. Don’s moobs looked thick and soft, akin to a woman’s breasts, with large purple nipples proudly pointing forward. His belly was perfectly round, seemingly pushed forward by his stomach, which prevented it from sagging too much. But the part under his belly button looked incredibly soft, like fresh dough before being baked. His penis bulged under his tight speedo, Jean could almost tell its precise outline. Don’s thighs were thicker than hams, they softly pressed against each other as he walked, and every part of him jiggled as he went inside the river.

 _I hope he turns around so I can see his ass and love handles too,_ Jean thought dreamily.

“Is it that bad?” Don asked worryingly.

Jean was shaken out of his rêverie.

“Huh? What do you mean?”

“You’ve been staring at me quite a lot,” Don said, arms crossed.

“Oh, uh, no no! I was just, staring off into space. Don’t worry, you’re good.”

“Right, sorry,” Don said. “After all, I’m not very fat, so I don’t have anything to worry about.”

“Precisely!”

Don walked further inside the water, taking his time to accommodate himself to the cold. Jean took the opportunity to glare at his backside. It was everything he had ever dreamed of, and maybe more. The love handles were perfectly round and plush, and the ass cheeks surprisingly big, even for a man his size (which was saying something). The speedo didn’t quite reach the top: it left very little to the imagination.

Jean dived under the water once his inspection was done, careful to hide his raging boner from the unsuspecting Don. They both swam for a bit – it was obvious Don was very uncomfortable at first, but he eventually let go of his worries, and seemed to enjoy playing in the water quite a lot.

They remained there for a solid hour – after that Don was the first to come out, exhausted. The sight of the water and sweat dripping off his skin and accentuating his body’s round shapes was excessively arousing, but Jean forced himself not to look, because after he came out of the river, he’d have no way of hiding his boner. Don stretched his arms, rode up his speedo which was dangerously close from falling off, and sat on the tree stump once more. His belly rumbled.

“Those pizzas’d better be damn good,” he commented as he tapped it. “I must have lost a few kilos from all this swimming around, so I can afford to eat a lot, right?”

“Yes, pretty much,” Jean said with a grin as he came out of the water and lied down on the grass. “I’ll make them extra-thick.”

Don’s belly rumbled again. It seemed the mere act of talking about food was enough to make him hungry.

“Say, you wouldn’t have happened to bring an extra sandwich?” He asked hopefully.

“No. I’ll be sure to do that next time.”

Jean didn’t want to leave right away. He wanted to enjoy the sun on his skin, and to dry off naturally. When Don’s impatience grew out of control, they both put their clothes back on, and walked back to the village. During the trip, Jean described in details how he was going to cook the pizzas, listing all of the ingredients. It was practically torture for Don, who eventually abandoned all dignity and began to run down the hill, hoping to get to the restaurant as fast as possible. Jean laughed and ran after him: they were both panting when they reached the restaurant’s front door.

“All right, sit down, I’ll bring you some fruits for the wait,” Jean said when they went in. “Get comfy, we’re probably going to be here a while.”

Don sat on the nearest chair, which creaked ominously when he rested his butt on it. He took off his vest immediately, and grabbed an apple. He forced himself to eat it very slowly (probably because he wanted to keep room for the pizzas). Meanwhile, in the kitchen, Jean began to work. Of course he had to make the dough himself, leave it to rest, gather all the ingredients, and shove everything down the oven once he was done – the process would take a while, and there was no way to speed it up. At some point, Don couldn’t bear to remain on his chair anymore, and so he joined him in the kitchen to see how the cooking progressed. Jean gave him some bread for the wait, which Don munched on slowly as he watched the pizza slowly baking inside the oven. When it was finally done, he was about to open the oven himself, but Jean pushed him aside.

“Now now. Let me serve it properly. Now go back to your seat.”

Don didn’t seem happy about that, but complied anyway. Jean purposefully took his time, cutting the pizza in little slices. He then grabbed a bottle of wine, two glasses, and brought everything to the table.

“It smells delicious,” Don said, almost teary-eyed. “May I…?”

“Dig in,” Jean said.

And Don began to eat. It was like those weird food eating competitions, when one had to eat a ridiculous amount of food as fast as possible. Except Don wasn’t even trying to be fast, he just couldn’t contain himself any longer. It was messy, it was gross, and short-lived. Once he was done with the first pizza, he drank a glass of wine to help it all go down properly. Then he moved on to the second pizza, eating it nearly as quickly as the first. Only when he reached the third did he begin to slow down, seemingly appreciating the taste a little more, careful to sense each different flavors on his tongue.

“It’s delicious. It’s really delicious. Thank you so much, that was definitely worth it.”

Jean smiled and blushed a little at the praise. This time he didn’t ask if Don wanted more: he waited for the man to actually ask for it himself. He wanted to see how long it would take: sixteen seconds was the answer.

“You wouldn’t happen to have some stocks to finish, do you?” Don asked shyly.

“Why, now that you remind me, I actually do!”

Don smiled brightly, then realized he wasn’t supposed to act like a glutton, and pretended to be detached.

“Well, uh… I can help you with that.”

He placed his hands under his heavy belly, and took off his belt. It seemed to have caused him a lot of pain, for he sighed in pleasure when it was undone.

_Just a little more and he’ll rip out these pants._

“Wait for me here, I’ll bring you more.”

Jean went back inside the kitchen – this time Don didn’t follow him (he probably felt too heavy to actually move from his chair). Naturally, Jean had predicted this outcome, and baked much more dough than he actually needed. Making the fourth, fifth and sixth pizza took less time thanks to that.

Don was only happy to eat them when they arrived. Stifling a belch, he got to work, taking bite after bite and drowning everything with wine. Jean could almost see his belly swelling. The striped shirt, which had used to cover him completely, rode all the way up his belly button. His pants cracked at the side too, but he didn’t seem to notice – and at the end he was still asking for more (although he was a little out of breath). Jean was happy to oblige: once he was done with pizza seven, eight and nine, he came back into the room, and practically had to feed Don himself this time. Why, Don’s belly took so much space that it bumped against the table when he tried to bend down to grab the food, and besides it hurt too much to do so.

Halfway through pizza number eight, Don began to fart and belch. He couldn’t really stop himself at this stage: it was short little expulsions of gas, which eventually forced Jean to stop feeding him for a little while to open the windows again.

“I’m sorry,” Don mumbled. “Please let me finish it, I’ll do my best to contain the gas,” he said as he farted once more. “Ah, sorry, it was the last one. No, sorry, last one. Last one, promise.”

Jean shoved a slice of pizza into his mouth to make him shut up. Don was red and sweaty, but he still moaned in pleasure when his mouth wrapped around it. His belly was practically screaming in protest, but he didn’t seem to mind, as long as he could eat more delicious food.

Halfway through pizza number nine, Don pushed Jean’s feeding hand away. Jean thought he was finally no longer hungry, but Don had another request in mind.

“Take off -hmmmf- my pants off, please.”

“Why?”

“It’s too… huff… tight,” he explained, wincing.

“Oh. You’ll have to get up for that, buddy.”

Jean gave Don a hand, and helped him up: it was surprisingly difficult, but they managed. Don’s pants were completely cracking up, they were split down his thighs on both sides. Jean kneeled behind Don’s butt, taking the opportunity to admire the view. Said butt was clenched tightly, Don was probably terrified to fart in his face. It took some efforts to pull the pants down, but Jean eventually managed it. The red speedo was holding up quite well, however.

“Ah, thanks,” Don said in relief, letting out a long fart as soon as Jean had moved. “I’ll sit down again.”

But when he tried to sit down on the chair, it broke under him, which startled him quite a lot. Jean began to laugh.

“Don’t make fun of me!” Don ordered, turning red, but the end of his sentence was drowned in a massive belch.

Jean fed him the rest of the pizza from the floor, and massaged his belly softly.

“Look at you, you’re so round,” Jean said lovingly.

“I’m not- hmmph!” Don said, as Jean shoved more food into his mouth.

“Such a lovely little pig! You’d really do anything for more tasty food, wouldn’t you?”

Don’s eyes widened.

“I’m not,” he began, out of breath, “fat! It’s just...”

He farted again. He didn’t seem to have enough room in his brain for rational though.

“Hmmph!” he mumbled as Jean stuffed the rest of the pizza in his mouth.

“There there. Good boy.”

“Hmm… good?”

“Very good.”

Don let out a very long fart, while Jean massaged his belly softly.

“That’s right, piggy. Let it all out. No need to feel ashamed.”

“Hmf,” Don said plaintively. “You tricked me. I didn’t want to eat that much.”

“Oh? Is that so? You were practically begging earlier.”

Don blushed violently.

“I wasn’t, how dare you!”

“You know you _love_ to overeat. No need to deny it! I’m not judging. It’s cute that my friend is a little glutton.”

“Sh-shut up,” Don said weakly. “I’m not fat, I’m not.”

“What am I wrapping my hands around then?” Jean teased, playfully stroking his belly.

“I told you, it’s normal for middle-aged men to gain a little weight,” Don said in shame. “I’m just bloated.”

“You truly think you’re not fat?” Jean asked curiously.

“Sure.”

“And I’m a little chunky myself,” Jean added, pointing to his chef roll.

“Yeah, you are. We’re not so different.”

“So in all logic, you should be able to wear my clothes just fine, right?”

“P-probably,” Don said defiantly.

“Well, how about we try it out?”

“N-now?” Don asked, in panic.

“Sure. You ripped your pants, so you’ll need new clothes when you get out anyway.”

“Oh… okay then.”

Helping Don getting up was a little difficult, but eventually they managed. Jean couldn’t really conceal his boner at this stage, but it didn’t matter: Don was too full and drunk to actually notice. They both went up the stairs, and ended up in Jean’s bedroom.

“Why don’t you take off your clothes?” Jean asked nicely. “I’ll bring you something else to wear.”

“Okay,” Don mumbled, removing his striped shirt, which was full of sweat anyway.

“So, how do we do this?”

Jean was looking through his drawers, in search of anything that Don could (fail to) wear.

“Whatchu mean?”

“It’s a bet, right? You’re confident you’ll win this?”

“Of course I am,” Don pouted. “I’m not much fatter than you, even bloated I should be able to wear your clothes just fine.”

“Okay, so what do I do if I lose?”

Don seemed puzzled by the question.

“I dunno actually. Nothing I guess. You just lose.”

“Okay then. But if _you_ lose the bet, then you’ll have to come to the summer festival with me.”

“What’s the summer festival?”

“It’s a local event that takes place every year. There’s music, food stands, a little dance show, and a food contest. You’ll have to participate, naturally.”

“A food contest? As in… making food? I’m no cook.”

“Oh no, not _that_ that kind of food contest. It’s the kind where you have to eat the most food in a short period of time.”

Don’s eyes shot wide.

“B-but if I do that, there’s a chance I...”

He looked away in shame.

“There’s a chance I’ll end up being gassy in front of so many people,” he mumbled.

“It wouldn’t be the first time,” Jean replied with a shrug. “Besides, why would you care? You’re not going to lose this bet, are you?”

“No, I’m not,” Don said confidently.

“Good. Then it’s settled. Let’s get started.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So how are you liking the story this far? Did it meet your expectations? It's definitely enjoyable to write, I can tell this much.


	5. How to lose a bet

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If I had to describe this fic to someone, I'd probably say something like "it's honestly not that deep... but probably still a little deeper than you'd think." That means that essentially, even though there should be fanservice in every chapter, I'm still going to have a little plot. It's simple, but it keeps the story together I think. I dunno, hope you guys like it. From the amount of kudos I've gotten so far, I can tell this is popular, but I guess that's just porn for you.

“So which do you want me to try out first?” Don asked confidently.

“Probably my shirts. This one is riding above your belly button, unless you want to show off your overhang tomorrow, you’ll need a new one.”

“Overhang? I don’t have one. I told you, I’m just chunky around the belly button. My belly doesn’t _spill.”_

“Okay then, but take it off and try to put this one on.”

Jean gave him a simple tank top, quite large and elastic, which he used to put on for sport sessions. Don took off his own shirt and took Jean’s, and attempted to wear it. It couldn’t even reach his belly button, no matter how far he pushed.

“Hmmpf,” Don groaned. “Just a lil’ more, wait for it. Hmmmpf!”

But no matter one, he couldn’t get it to fit all the way down.

“This one probably wouldn’t fit you either,” he said angrily. “Give me another one.”

“Okay!”

Jean gave him a smaller shirt. Don tried to put it on, struggled to get it to ride over his moobs, and tugged it down as far as it could go. It was even worse than last time.

“It looks like a crop top on you,” Jean said with a chuckle.

“Oh come on, if you’re giving me clothes you can’t even wear, this is unfair!” Don complained.

“Is that what you really think? Okay, I’ll wear it myself then, and you’ll see that it fits me just fine.”

Don took off the short red shirt with difficulty and gave it to Jean. Jean took off his own shirt, and put on the red one: it fit him just fine.

“H-how,” Don said in a hollow voice.

“You lose,” Jean said with a smirk.

“No!” Don shouted. “It’s impossible! I can’t be so…”

“… so fat?”

Don looked really furious and embarrassed at the same time. For a while he remained silent, folding his arms above his bare chest, looking for the right words.

“Damn it,” he grunted. “It’s not my fault, I have a slow metabolism,” he mumbled. “Okay, sure, I may be fat, but it’s not like I couldn’t lose the weight if I wanted to.”

He was blushing and sweating, trying to cover his own belly with his hands. Jean carefully took them away, and seized Don’s gut with his own, massaging it carefully.

“You sure about that, fatty?”

“D-don’t make fun of me,” Don stuttered. “It’s your fault, _you_ made me overeat! I didn’t want to become a fatty.”

Jean was still stroking his gut, carefully, from top to bottom, taking a moment to caress the nipples as he went. Don was breathing a little more slowly now. It seemed like he was enjoying it, just a little. But his anger suddenly deflated, and he looked down in defeat.

“I’m so fat,” he admitted sadly. “You were right, I’m just a pig.”

“It’s okay,” Jean said quietly.

“No, it’s not. I’m not okay.”

He looked like he was about to cry, all of a second. Jean wrapped him in his arms for a hug.

“Hey, it’s fine you know?” He told him. “You were already fat when I met you, but it didn’t stop me from liking you.”

“I made such a fool of myself,” Don wailed.

“You kinda did,” Jean admitted. “But I still think you’re cool.”

Don didn’t reply anything. For a while, they remained together in his room, hugging each other silently. Don was sniffling.

“You want to stay here for the night?” Jean asked kindly.

“Yeah.”

“Okay. You can take my bed. Tomorrow I’ll go out and buy you some bigger clothes, okay? So you don’t have to show off your belly in front of everyone if you don’t want to.”

“Thanks,” Don replied, sniffling again.

They finally parted, and Don went to lie down on Jean’s bed, who felt lucky he had recently bought a large couch. They spent a relatively peaceful night. Jean kept the window opened, listening to the crickets and occasionally getting up to watch the stars, while Don snored. He didn’t care about sleeping late, because tomorrow was Sunday: he could afford to oversleep.

He woke up at 11am the next day, feeling a little dizzy. He stretched a little, put on some clothes, and walked down the stairs. A nice smell was coming from the kitchen: when he came in, he found Don alone in his underwear, making breakfast.

“Good day!” Jean said cheerfully. “How are you doing today?”

“Much better, thank you. This is the third breakfast I’m making.”

“Third? How come?”

“I made the first two for us to share, but you were still asleep, so I ate them myself.”

He patted his own belly thoughtfully.

“But I’m still hungry and you haven’t had anything to eat, so here it is. There’s a pie currently baking in the oven. I’ll pay you for the supplies I took, of course.”

Jean crouched next to the oven, looking at the pie. It was huge, but he had no doubt he and Don could finish it in one meal. Getting back up, he looked at the man himself, currently washing the dishes. He had definitely kept the weight from yesterday’s stuffing session. It looked very difficult for him to wash the dishes, because his belly was getting in the way. It was like constantly walking around with a football under your shirt, except Don was currently shirtless, and the football was pure fate.

“Well, thank you for making breakfast,” Jean said with a smile. “I love pie. What kind of pie did you make?”

“Apple pie, I don’t know how to bake any other kind.”

It turned out that Don wasn’t as good a cook as Jean was, which made sense considering it wasn’t his job. But the pie was still fairly tasty, and Jean was happy to have someone else do the cooking, for once.

“You said you would buy some large clothes for me,” Don said. “But it’s Sunday, all the stores will be closed.”

“Oh, shit, you’re right,” Jean realized, face-palming. “Guess it’ll have to wait until tomorrow, huh. You can just spend the day here.”

“No,” Don replied, a little firmly.

“Huh?”

“I don’t want to abuse your hospitality. I’ll simply leave with the clothes I own, and let people laugh at me if they want to.”

“Oh, uh, okay. It’d be fine if you stayed, you know.”

“I need to go back to my hotel room,” Don explained. “I have some files to sort out.”

When breakfast was over, Don put his clothes back on. His own shirt still could only cover half of his belly, his pants left a large part of his butt exposed. He looked really embarrassed, yet very determined to go out anyway.

“I have a question for you,” Jean asked before he left. “Would you like to play chess with me some day?”

Don suddenly froze, his face completely unreadable. For Jean, this was the last piece of the puzzle, the one way to prove Don’s real identity. Heymans had always been a prodigy when it came to strategic games: he could win a game of chess against anyone.

“No,” he eventually replied. “I don’t like chess.”

“Oh please,” Jean said. “I’ll bake you some good-”

“I said no,” Don cut in coldly. “Don’t try to use food to force me to do something I don’t want to do.”

“But Don...”

“I’m leaving. Have a nice day.”

He opened the door, and walked out, bathing in the sun’s light. Jean felt really sad all of a second, as if a large piece of cold metal was suddenly weighing on his heart.

“But Don,” he said before the man could get too far. “Don’t you realize? You’ve just proven to me who you are.”

Don froze again, and turned around slowly. He looked angry, but also very scared.

“What do you mean?”

“You know what I mean, Heymans. Did you really think you could hide your identity from me? We were best friends before, I haven’t forgotten.”

Heymans didn’t say anything. He seemed conflicted.

“Why?” Jean asked, in pain. “Why did you lie to me?”

Heymans was still not saying anything, but Jean needed to know, so he repeated his last question.

“Why did you lie to me, Heymans?”

“Why would I _not_ lie?” Heymans suddenly yelled, tears of anger rolling down his cheeks. “After everything, you still don’t get it? How can you be so _stupid?”_

He nearly spat the last word, his whole body was shaking a little. Unable to face Jean anymor, he suddenly ran off, greatly surprising the passerbys. Jean didn’t have the heart to go after him.

_Call me an idiot_ _all you want_ _, but I just don’t get it. Why would you need to do that? What could make you believe I’d love Don, but not Heymans?_


	6. Reunited

Following that event, Jean didn’t see Heymans again for weeks. He wouldn’t come to the restaurant, he wouldn’t be seen anywhere in the village. Some of Jean’s clients reported seeing him every now and then, so he couldn’t have left (after all, his job wasn’t done) – but Jean wasn’t lucky enough to run into him. At any rate, it was obvious Heymans was avoiding him: even if they happened to randomly meet, the fatter man would just run away again.

It made Jean feel both sad and frustrated. He was racking his brain trying to figure out why Heymans had lied to him. He could come up with a few theories, but how would he ever know which one was true?

Summer ended, soon to be replaced by autumn. Jean was done being frustrated and sad: now he was just lonely. He hadn’t realized something was missing from his life before seeing “Don” again after so many years, but it was clear that he lacked a best friend in his existence. And besides, there was that strange other part from his brain, which loved to feed Heymans until he was overstuffed, to make his belly grow, to hear him moaning in pain when he overate. Jean never knew what to make of it, but it _wouldn’t shut up_ since the man had disappeared from his life – and it didn’t help that he worked in a kitchen. Every day he would ponder: had Heymans eaten? Would he like the food he was currently cooking? If he saw him again, would he be fatter or skinnier? And thus, and so on.

Jean ended up being lucky, but only a month later. It was a Sunday, and he was walking a friend’s dog. He walked across the elder bridge, and up the hill where he and Heymans had had a picnic a while back. He was astonished to find the man at the top of the hill, inspecting yet again what looked like a weird statue. After so long, it felt so weird to randomly bump into him.

“Heymans!” He shouted in shock, before cursing himself for his lack of subtlety.

Heymans turned around, and Jean felt his cheeks flush. He was even fatter than before: if things continued, he’d end up being larger than he was tall. He was wearing a shirt, but couldn’t button it down completely, and it stretched ridiculously over his protruding gut.

“Oh, it’s you,” Heymans said grumpily. “Go away, I don’t want to see you again.”

“Is that really true?” Jean asked, almost tearfully. “Do you really hate me?”

Heymans seemed caught off guard. He was sweating a little, and avoided Jean’s gaze.

“We have nothing to do with each other. Please leave me alone, I have some work to do.”

“Please,” Jean pleaded, taking a step forward. “Explain to me, why are you running away like that? I really miss you.”

Heymans didn’t seem to know what to respond to that. His face betrayed a mixture of anger and embarrassment. He didn’t seem to know what to say.

“I don’t know why you lied to me,” Jean said. “But I don’t care! I want to be your friend again.”

“But why?” Heymans asked very quietly.

He still looked a little angry, but more confused than anything else.

“I betrayed you. All those years ago, I cheated, and I took your rightful place among the military. I robbed you of your lifelong dream! And for what? Just _look_ at me. Look what I _made_ with your dream. I had good chances, but I wasted them all, and now I’m this obese cop who investigates petty crimes! By all means, you should hate me! So why… why are you looking at me like that?”

“Jesus, Heymans,” Jean said, rubbing his eyes. “How can you be so dense? I don’t care about that. It was years ago! Sure, it hurt me a lot back then, and I was hit pretty hard by depression afterwards. But like… I got over it, you know? I moved on. I found a new place to live, a new job, and I made a life for myself. Why are you still stuck in the past? Why can’t you forgive yourself?”

“How could I ever forgive myself?” Heymans retorted, desperately trying to keep his voice firm. “I betrayed my best friend. No one should trust me ever again.”

He looked aside, as if the mere sight of Jean was causing him pain.

“That’s why I hid who I was. I didn’t want you to find out that this idiotic pig was what your childhood friend had become. I didn’t want to make your pain worse. I thought… with a new name, a new start, maybe I could… try again? Lie to myself and to you so we could be happy. But now that you know who I am, there’s no point anymore.”

Jean took another step forward. He sighed.

“God, I forgot how stubborn you were. You’re so fixated on hating yourself, you don’t even realize you’re hurting me!”

“What?”

“And besides, that plan of yours? It was idiotic. How did you expect me to _not_ recognize you? Seriously!”

Heymans blushed in shame.

“I didn’t think I mattered to you,” he mumbled, taking a step back. “I… I shouldn’t.”

“Just allow me to forgive you, damn it!”

“But...”

“Come on,” Jean said, taking another step forward. “Please, just listen for real. I don’t care.”

“You...”

“I don’t care about what you did ten years ago, because I’m over it. I don’t care about what you became, because it’s your life and not mine. And I _especially_ don’t care about how much weight you’ve put on, god that’s the _least_ of my worries, bud.”

Heymans looked at his feet in shame (except he probably couldn’t see them anymore, but he surely seemed to try).

“I… I was worried,” he confessed. “Because of all the times you teased me for my weight, when I was pretending to be Don.”

“I was just joking! You could have just told me it hurt you, I would have stopped.”

Heymans didn’t seem to know what else to say, so Jean took the last step, and hugged him. He was incredibly soft, it was like hugging a gigantic pillow. There was so much fat by now, Jean was afraid to drown inside.

“God you’re comfy,” he said in delight. “I love this.”

“I’ve, uh… been binge eating a lot,” Heymans admitted with a nervous chuckle. “I didn’t really know what to do without you.”

“Idiot,” Jean snickered. “Your pride will be your downfall.”

He finally let go of his very large friend, smiling at him.

“You want to go home and eat some burgers?”

Heymans’ belly rumbled loudly.

“Oh yes please,” he said, smiling in turn. “I’ve really missed your cooking, can’t find any good burgers around the place.”

“Of course you wouldn’t. Come on now, take my hand.”

They both went down the hill together. Jean had almost forgotten the dog, which Heymans was only glad to pet. The only problem was, it was a rather tiny dog, and he couldn’t bend forward that easily with his belly getting in the way. Still, the dog was happy for the affection.

Back at the restaurant, Jean and Heymans quickly got to work. Jean took care of most of the cooking, but he let Heymans deal with the simpler issues.

“You really _are_ fat now,” he said in the chuckle, when Heymans nearly got stuck into a door. “Probably the fattest man in the country, at the very least.”

“Come on, I’m not _that...”_

He didn’t finish his sentence.

“Okay, I might be _that_ fat,” he admitted. “So what? I like my whale belly.”

“Me too! Let’s fill it to the brim! I’ll make you burst out of these clothes, my man.”

“I’d like to see you try,” Heymans replied with a grin.

Later, Heymans sat on one of the chairs (two chairs actually, his butt was now too large for just one) and waited for Jean to feed him. His belly was too big for him to actually reach the table with ease, and he didn’t like to bend forward when he ate.

“Let me warn you though,” Heymans said after he finished the third burger, putting both hands around his belly. “I’m still gassy when I eat junk food, it hasn’t improved at all. If anything, it’s even worse now. Are you sure you’re okay with this?”

“I’ll just open the windows again,” Jean said. “But yeah sure, let it all out. No shame between bros.”

To show that he had understood, Heymans let out a big fart, moaning in pleasure.

“I’ve been meaning to release that one for a while,” he admitted, tapping his belly again. “Since we were on top of the hill, actually.”

“There’ll be more to come soon, I bet,” Jean replied, shoving more food in his mouth. “C’mon, eat up.”

Heymans ate fifteen burgers before he finally ran out of room in his stomach. And they were pretty big burgers too, each enough to fill a normal person’s stomach to the brim. By the end, he was sweating and moaning, releasing gas every minute. He was completely red and had removed his shirt, massaging his stomach carefully.

“The more I look at you, the more I see how big you’re getting,” Jean noted.

He put his hands around Heymans’ shoulders, testing the fat which was sagging from his arms, particularly thick in that specific area. He went down from there, pressing the man’s backs, testing his love handles like another man would have with a lady’s breasts.

“It’s downright absurd,” Heymans chuckled. “I’ve been gaining a lot of ass too. I’ve had to buy those undies that can stretch very widely, because they kept ripping at the worse of times.”

“Worse of times? That sounds like you have an embarrassing story to tell, and I’m all in for it.”

“Uh… no thanks. I think I’ve embarrassed myself enough, already.”

“Hey, you gotta make it up for it somehow, don’t you? For lying to me and ignoring me for a month!”

Heymans folded his arms, looking quite annoyed – but with how big his cheeks had gotten, he could only seem cute.

“Fine,” he said reluctantly. “It was a week ago. I was investigating the hills, when I heard someone cursing quite loudly by the river. When I came to check what was going on, I found a lonely fisherman, who told me he had lost his glasses at the bottom of the river. I took off my clothes and walked inside the water, spent a little while looking for said glasses, and when I eventually found them, I gave them back to the guy. Turns out he couldn’t see anything without them, so I spared him from having a very annoying day. He was deeply thankful, and offered me some food as a reward. Naturally, I accepted,” he added with a pat on his belly.

“I would have been disappointed in you if you hadn’t,” Jean replied with a smirk. “So when does the undies ripping come into play?”

“Turns out the guy had a lot of food to spare, and even cooked some of the fish he had just caught for me. I probably ate a little too much and didn’t realize the fabric of my undies was stretching. I hadn’t put the rest of my clothes back on, because I wasn’t dry yet. When eventually we parted ways, the man bowed to me. I wanted to return the gesture, but I probably shouldn’t have. It was too much for my poor speedo, which ripped, leaving me completely naked in front of a stranger.”

Heymans was doing an admirable effort to remain calm and composed, but his cheeks were bright red, and he was sweating.

“And that’s it for my embarrassing story. Satisfied now?”

“Oh, you bet. That was very juicy.”

“Mpf. I deserve another burger for allowing you to make fun of me like that, don’t I?”

“Two burgers even!” Jean replied cheerfully.

Truth be told, he didn’t know why Heymans was requesting more food, as he seemed completely stuffed already. When he saw the two burgers, recalling how big they were, his eyes bore a strange expression, which Jean would describe as a mixture of fear and greed. There might have been a bit of lust in there as well.

Jean brought the first to his mouth, and Heymans bit it without hesitation. His double chin was trembling a little as he ate, in fact his whole body shook with each of his movements. He kept massaging himself with his free hands as Jean pushed the burger into his mouth, forcing him to chew quickly.

“Mmmf, mmmmf,” Heymans moaned. “Oh I’m so fat, I can’t believe I’m so fat, mmf!”

Jean had promptly stuffed the second burger into his mouth, which Heymans chewed relatively slowly.

“I need… huff… something to drink,” he begged, stifling a belch.

“Finish this and you’ll get a glass of milk,” Jean promised.

He stuffed the rest of the burger in Heymans’ mouth, who in turn farted and closed his eyes with pleasure.

“Do you like my burgers, fat boy?” Jean asked seductively.

Heymans nodded.

“Will you be taking a third one then?”

Something flashed in Heymans’ eyes, and it looked a lot like fear – but it soon turned into determination, and he nodded again. He obviously hurt as he bit into it, even more as he chewed and swallowed it, and his belly let out a noise of complaint. He was sweating harder, but Jean quietly brushed his forehead with his sleeve.

“Water,” Heymans begged.

“Shh. Finish it first.”

Heymans bit into the third burger again, filling his cheeks with food, and chewed for what seemed like an eternity before he finally swallowed.

“Oof,” he complained. “Holy shit that hurts. Oh shit.”

“You’re doing great.”

“I… feel great,” Heymans admitted, smiling through the sweat and farts.

He grabbed Jean’s hand, almost aggressively.

“Please feed me more,” he begged.

“More? Are you sure you can handle it?”

“I want to be fatter. Please. I need your help.”

Jean nodded calmly, and rushed to the kitchen. He had run out of burgers, but the specific type of food probably mattered very little at this point, so he brought as much as he could carry with his two arms, and dumped it all on the table. Heymans was waiting expectantly, so Jean grabbed a box of cookies, and inserted them in his mouth one by one. He seemed to be beyond pain by that point, transported by the pleasure of stuffing himself and expanding his waistline. It must have lasted half-an hour: Jean could practically see his friend fattening in real time. Soon Heymans ripped his shorts, and had nothing to wear but his dark trunks. They continued for a while, until Heymans began to yell in pain, and Jean knew it was better to stop before he killed him. He was burping and farting with every passing second, in very short strokes, completely out of breath. His belly was now reaching further than his knees and his man-breasts were as big as melons. Jean kissed him on the forehead, almost drowning in the mixture of smells the man was secreting.

“So how do you feel now?” He asked quietly.

“Ashamed, in a delightful way,” Heymans replied when he regained control over himself.

“As it should be, then,” Jean replied as he patted his belly proudly.


	7. A trip to the city

Jean and Heymans slept together. Heymans thought he was too tired and bloated for sex at first, but Jean managed to convince him otherwise. First it was quite shy and simple: he caressed his body, tested his curves, sometimes grabbed his rolls a little firmly, rarely shaking them. Heymans would frequently moan in pain, but never asked Jean to stop. So Jean went a little further, undressed his friend slowly and carefully, massaged his cock and nipples simultaneously.

“You’re okay with this?”

“Yeah,” Heymans said after a while. “Keep going.”

From that point and on, Jean decided to be a little more firm, more active. He would frequently ask Heymans to switch positions: resting on his back, standing on all fours, raising his legs in the air. Each time Heymans obeyed: he was completely passive, and let Jean do whatever he wanted with his body. It didn’t last all that long, because both were tired, but it was still a very erotic moment for both partners.

The next day, Jean woke up alone. He was amused by the massive crease in his mattress, proof that Heymans had slept in the same bed as he. But where had he gone to?

_Probably not very far, all things considered. His clothes don’t fit, I bet he’ll be wanting new ones._

Jean left his bed and put his clothes on without a hurry. When he went downstairs, he found Heymans alone in his kitchen, eating a fruit salad.

“Yo,” the fat man said. “I was hungry so I took some of your stuff. I’ll pay for it, of course.”

“Sure, eat as much as you like,” Jean replied with a smile. “Quick question though: why are you naked?”

“I’m not naked, I’m wearing my underwear.”

To prove his point, he got up and turned around (his belly was so big that it hid his crotch, which essentially made him look naked from the front). The poor speedo he was wearing could barely conceal a tiny fragment of his enormous butt, and it wasn’t even the top. Jean felt instantly turned on, but it was maybe a little early for that. Heymans sat down once more.

“So what are the plans for today?” Jean asked as he put his apron on.

“Work,” Heymans replied. “I’ve found where the cult is hiding, so I’ll pay them a visit.”

“Cult?”

“Oh, y’know. The ones the villagers call “wizards”. The ones who’ve been erecting the strange statues, and performing other acts of illegal alchemy, among other things.”

“Oh, right! Don’t you think it’s dangerous though?”

“No, not really. I don’t think they’ll attack me, and if they do, I’ll teach them not to mess with the military. I still know how to fight.”

“Is that so?” Jean asked with a smirk. “You’re not exactly the man you used to be,” he added, planting his index finger in Heymans’ huge belly (causing him to fart again). “Are you sure you shouldn’t bring someone with you?”

“That’s… a good point. Say, will you help me out? We could have a friendly fight, to see if I still got this.”

His belly rumbled.

“After breakfast.”

“You’ve already had breakfast.”

“But you’re making food, aren’t you? Isn’t it for me?”

Jean smiled again.

“Why, you didn’t tell me you were still hungry! I’ll have to make an extra portion I guess. Shame, I really wanted to keep all the food for myself.”

“Don’t make fun of me,” Heymans warned, trying to sound severe but failing miserably.

“Of course not, piggy. I would never.”

Heymans sighed, but it was clear how hungry he was. Jean didn’t go for subtlety, and prepared a huge portion of porridge, keeping a small bowl for himself and leaving the rest to Heymans. Porridge was thick, heavy and sugary, so he felt like it was the perfect breakfast for his friend. Heymans looked very happy to eat the whole thing, though he seemed to have trouble finishing it, so Jean had to help him.

“You’re amazing,” he complimented, kissing his friend on the forehead.

“Thanks,” Heymans replied, patting his belly appreciatively. “Let’s have this friendly fight, okay?”

“Sure! We can use my backyard, no one will see us there.”

The backyard was a rather small square of grass surrounded by high walls. It had originally been his uncle’s secret garden, but Jean was terrible at gardening and had made a terrible job of keeping it alive. Heymans requested a bit of time before the fight began, to digest his breakfast, but Jean argued that he wouldn’t always have the luxury. Heymans reluctantly agreed, and the fight began.

It was a humiliation.

Jean wasn’t so good at fighting: his military days were long gone, and he hadn’t really practiced all that much during the last ten years. Still, he was relatively fast, and it was more than enough to beat Heymans at his game. All he had to do was target the belly: one hit and Heymans would yell “oompf” before falling to his butt with a fart. He tried to protect it with his arms, but they had gotten a little short for the task.

“It’s not fair, it’s because I just ate,” Heymans complained as he got up from the floor for the 6th time in a row.

“But you always eat,” Jean objected. “Maybe you’re just not really meant for fist fights anymore?”

Heymans crossed his arms grumpily and came back to the kitchen. Jean followed him, and found him sitting on a chair, chewing on some bread.

“I’ll give you some time to cool off.”

Jean walked outside to smoke a cigarette, gazing at the people around him as they walked the streets. Few of them said hello to him, and he responded with a silent wave. He stood there for half an hour, and went back inside. He found Heymans “dressed up”, which meant he had tried to button his shirt over his huge belly (but only managing the first, the one between his moobs) and to put on his ripped shorts.

“You’re going somewhere?”

“HQ. If I want to confront the cult today, I’ll need to wear my uniform. But the one I used to wear doesn’t fit anymore and I ordered a new one, so I’ll have to go and look for it first.”

“Wearing… that?” Jean gestured to his ridiculous attire.

“Wearing that, yes. It’s going to be embarrassing, so I wouldn’t mind if you came with me.”

“Oh no problem, I can come, as long as you’re done skulking.”

Heymans looked away in shame, but didn’t reply. They both walked to the front door together. Jean opened it and exited first. Heymans took a deep breath, and followed him.

They had to walk toward the outskirts of the village, to take a bus. During their short walk, Heymans did his best to look blank and pretend to not notice the villagers staring at him. Seeing such a fat man was already a rare sight, seeing one having practically burst out of his clothes was even more surprising (especially considering his exposed backside). But the humiliations didn’t end there: his ass had gotten so big that it took two seats in the bus. He originally wanted to sit next to a woman, but she got up to leave him enough space to fit _both_ his buttocks, instead of leaving one hanging in the air. He thanked her, but couldn’t help but let out a little fart as he moved, making the situation even worse.

“I’d sit on your lap, but I can’t see your lap,” Jean commented with a smile after she left. “How are you holding up so far?”

“Not great,” Heymans admitted, sweating. “Trying really hard not to fart.”

“Too much gas?”

“Being nervous makes me fart.”

“Oh. That’s bad luck.”

Despite his best efforts, Heymans didn’t manage to hold his farts in, and all were heard in the relatively quiet bus. It didn’t come off as much of a shock when most of the people left at the next stop, making Heymans blush and sweat even harder.

“Can’t complain,” Jean commented. “At least we have plenty of space now.”

“Shut up. If you hadn’t overfed me, this wouldn’t have happened.”

“Huhu. But don’t you loooove when I overfeed you, my dear friend?”

Heymans didn’t reply. Jean left him to his gassy brood, and looked through the window. The city was already drawing near, it was the first time he visited it in years.

“Where’s your HQ?” He asked Heymans. “Is it that tall building over here? Or that one?”

“It’s underground.”

“Oh, I see. Or rather, I don’t.”

“It’s a pretty cool place, I’ll show you.”

But at the entrance, they refused to let Heymans get in, because he wasn’t dressed appropriately. The duo had to enter a clothes shop and buy the largest attire they could find: the task was to find shorts that would fit around his huge ass, which wasn’t easy. The stares made Heymans feel embarrassed, and sometimes the dressing rooms were too small for him. Eventually they found a stupidly overpriced pair of Lycra shorts, and a white t-shirt which covered half of his gut, which wasn’t great, but still better than exposing his nipples for the whole city to see. Heymans paid for everything, but asked for a food break before they went back to his HQ. He ate seven plates of meat stew at a rather cheap restaurant, and would have eaten more if Jean hadn’t advised him not to (fearing that the man would rip his newly bought shorts). Heymans was grumpy about leaving the restaurant hungry, and Jean bought him a huge ice cream to compensate.

The guard at the HQ’s entrance wasn’t very pleased to let Heymans in, but couldn’t find any excuse to kick them out, since “belly-button exposure” wasn’t a crime in any rule book yet (and neither was “excessive gassing in public spaces”).

“Wow,” Jean appreciated while they were in the main hall. “This place is huge!”

There was a large quantity of offices and people in uniforms walking in every direction. The doors were of various sizes, and the walls covered in golden pipes, which were used to send messages to the other floors. Someone was playing the piano somewhere, a woman was pushing a dolly filled with lethal weapons, a teacher was leading a group of teens to a large door, probably to give them a tour of the place. Heymans walked quickly toward a specific door, then led Jean through a set of stairs, then into a hallway, and then another one, and basically Jean was lost. The walk seemed to take forever (though in truth, it must have only been fifteen minutes). At some point Heymans stopped, and knocked on a door. A tall man with gray hair opened the door for him, blinking with surprise.

“Officer Breda? I expected you two hours ago!”

“My bad, we’ve been delayed. Did my new uniform arrive?”

“It did, there’s a crate with your name in the warehouse. But you’ve gotten bigger since the day you ordered it, so is it even going to fit?”

“I requested a stretchable fabric, so I think it should be fine,” Heymans replied with dignity. “Besides I’m not that big.”

“Hm. Well if you say so. Should I send someone to help you wear it?”

Heymans blushed angrily.

“Should you what?”

“You totally should,” Jean chimed in.

Heymans cast him a furious (and confused) glare.

“You think so?” The gray-haired man asked. “I did hear those new uniforms can be… uh… tricky to wear, so I wouldn’t-”

“My friend here can help me,” Heymans cut in furiously.

“Oh but it’s so much work for little old me,” Jean added with a smirk. “Please do bring the help.”

“I will,” the gray-haired man promised. “Now go to the warehouse, they’ll meet you there.”

He shoved Heymans and Jean out, and closed the door.

“Why on earth did you do that?” Heymans asked angrily (though by now he also sounded a little worried).

“Who can say? I figured it could be fun. Come on, let’s get this over with.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, 7 chapters! I never thought my story was going to be that long. Hope you're still enjoying it, leave suggestions in the comments while you still can!


	8. Confrontation

The helper was a little brow-haired woman called Sheska, who lead Jean and Heymans inside an empty changing room, carrying the box that contained the new uniform. Jean chatted a little with her and found out that she was one of the captain’s daughters, who did all sorts of odd jobs around the place.

“I’m usually in the archives you see, sorting papers and files! It’s a few floors below, rather quiet and chilly place, no one comes to bother me. I’ve never had to actually help someone wear their uniform before! I have to say, I’m quite excited.”

“That truly won’t be necessary,” Heymans insisted.

“Oh don’t worry about me, I’m always glad to help!”

She put the box on a bench and turned around.

“Now sir, you’ll have to take off your clothes first,” she said with a smile. “Should I help you with that too?”

“No no no, I’m quite fine.”

But as it turned out, he did need help. Removing the t-shirt wasn’t exactly difficult, but the Lycra shorts gave him a little extra trouble, because he could barely bend forward. Jean and Sheska each grabbed a side and pulled it down his thighs.

“I keep telling you, that isn’t necessary,” Heymans insisted, blushing harder and harder.

“We have to do this every day,” Jean told Sheska with a wink. “My friend here can’t dress up on his own, so I have to help him! That’s what happens when you’re so fat.”

“What?” Heymans asked in shock. “That’s not true!”

“It’s okay sir, you don’t have to be embarrassed!” Sheska replied with a giggle. “My boyfriend is chunky too, so I’m used to this.”

She opened the box, and took out the uniform. It was dark and blue, and looked a little like a wetsuit. There was only one part, and Jean seriously wondered how they were going to fit all of Heymans inside.

“Now, how should we proceed?” Sheska wondered out loud.

“Let’s undo the zipper, for a start,” Jean replied.

The task was a lot more complex than it had seemed at first glance. The uniform _could_ stretch, but it took some efforts, and Heyman’s rolls kept getting in the way. Getting it up to his knees was easy enough, but the butt gave a lot of resistance, and that was nothing to say about the belly.

“Please tuck it in sir,” Sheska was asking kindly.

“I _am_ tucking it in!” Heymans protested. “I’ve been doing nothing but that for the last ten minutes!”

“Well, tuck it in more,” Jean suggested as he put his hand against Heymans’ stomach, trying to push it back a bit.

Eventually they managed to fit everything under the fabric, and to tie the zipper up. Jean took a few steps back to admire his work, and whistled.

The uniform technically covered Heymans, but it did _nothing_ to hide his curves. The fabric stuck so perfectly to his frame that nothing was left to the imagination, not even his nipples. There was even a crease around his belly button, and between his butt cheeks.

“Well, now you’re never taking that thing of,” Jean said with a sigh. “I’m not helping you put it on again.”

“Of course not, because I don’t need you to,” Heymans said, irritated.

“Whew, that was fun!” Sheska commented, oblivious to the man’s discomfort. “I have to go now. Have a pleasant afternoon, both of you!”

They left HQ together, took another bus that lead them back to the village, had a mid-afternoon snack, and then Heymans was on his way.

“Where are you going again?” Jean asked with a yawn.

“Confronting the cult, I told you this morning already.”

“Oh, sounds fun. Can I come?”

“Uh… sure, if you want. They might get aggressive though, so you’d better hide behind me, got it?”

“Ha, that won’t be hard.”

“Shut up.”

And so they went. Climbing up the mountain was a little difficult for Jean, who felt a little embarrassed about having to take breaks every now and then, when his massively obese friend seemed to have no trouble at all with the task. On the way, Heymans explained how he had found the hideout. Apparently the “wizards” had been using the statues as some kind of code: each week they switched their hideout to a different cave (apparently there were quite a lot in the area), and the statues served as intelligently conceived signals as to which one was currently in use.

“That’s the thing, the statues are so weird-looking that people expect them to be part of the cult,” Heymans explained. “Like a way to please some deity or other by making offerings. But it’s just a way to conceal an arrow that points to whatever cave they’re currently in.”

“How needlessly complicated,” Jean commented with a yawn.

“It took me months to figure it out,” Heymans admitted in frustration. “I felt so stupid when I realized. All this time I had been studying various languages, codes, iconography and art, in an attempt to understand whatever this all meant, and in the end it was just arrows.”

“They must have been laughing at you,” Jean snickered.

“You bet. But now they can’t hide from me anymore.”

Heymans pointed to a little path on their right.

“They’re over there. I captured one of them yesterday, she told me they’d be having a meal at this hour, so they shouldn’t be expecting anyone. She also told me they don’t put guards at the entrance.”

“So basically we just barge in and say ‘It’s the police, you’re under arrest!’, right?”

“Let me handle that. It’s my job after all, not yours.”

Jean was very excited about the upcoming confrontation. He wasn’t exactly scared: he expected this cult thing to be a group of kids in dark capes, reading thick books and crafting little spells to impress each other. Surely, when faced with a figure of authority, they’d apologize and agree to never do it again.

He walked inside the cave, not waiting for Heymans’ approval. He heard his friend telling him to slow down, but ignored his warning. The cave was darker than he had first expected, but there was a light at the end, maybe thirty feet away.

Jean began to run. He heard a noise, coming from his left. Surprised, he stopped running, and turned his head, trying to see through the darkness.

“Hello?” He asked.

Then something hit his head and he collapsed on the floor, stunned.


	9. Sacrificial ritual

Jean woke up tied to a chair in a dimly lit room. A piece of tape had been stuck to his mouth to prevent him from talking. He was still in the cave, from what he could tell, but it had been furnished like a modern apartment – clearly someone (or more than one person) lived there. Three people stood over him, grinning to themselves. They looked stunningly average: they didn’t wear any dark capes, didn’t bear any strange tattoos, or anything that could make a person think “surely, this one belongs to a dangerous cult”. One of them might have even visited Jean’s restaurant at one point, though he wasn’t sure.

They all wore gloves, with complex pentacles drawn on the palm side, as was typical with alchemists. Jean had no idea what their power could be, but he feared it.

“Is that the cop who’s been snooping around our place for months?” Asked one of the men. “The one you told me about?”

“No you idiot, it was a fat ginger man. This one is blond and skinny.”

“He’s a little fat, and his hair looks ginger in the light,” the first man pouted.

“You haven’t seen the other one. He wasn’t just a little fat, he was huge. My mom used to say cops are pigs, and I can see why now.”

Jean could hardly focus on the conversation. His head hurt more than during a hangover, and he could feel some dried blood on his temple. The bastards had attacked him! They had dared knock him out! Weren’t they supposed to be having a meal? He couldn’t see anyone beside the three villagers. And where was Heymans?

Some footsteps were heard. The three villagers froze. There were two men and a woman, each seemed to be very young adults, no older than twenty.

“It’s the police,” Heymans said calmly upon walking into the room, waving his badge at the three. “You are under arrest for theft, illegal use of alchemy, and physical harm on my friend over here. Come quietly, and I promise this you won’t be hurt.”

“Ah, now I understand what you meant,” said one of the men. “When you said he was fat, you really meant _fat_. This man looks like he swallowed a beach ball!”

“We won’t come quietly,” the other man (who seemed to be the leader) said defiantly. “Get the fuck out, you pig.”

“He’s unarmed,” the woman noted. “That’s strange, I would have expected him to come with a gun.”

“Oh you’re right,” the other man agreed. “He’s got no weapon, and I don’t see any circle either. Hey copper, you’re a fool or what?”

“I’m no fool,” Heymans replied calmly. “And perfectly capable of defending myself.”

That gave the three villagers pause. Jean was sweating. He knew Heymans was absolutely not capable of defending himself, quite the opposite.

 _Still, he told me that he had been studying alchemy,_ Jean recalled. _If he uses that, he should be able to win the fight._

“We’ll take the chance,” the leader said.

“Very well,” Heymans replied, clapping his hands.

A large magic circle began to glow. It hadn’t been drawn on the wall, ground or one of his hands, but tattooed directly on his belly. Jean wondered why he had never seen it before – perhaps there was a spell at hand, to make it look invisible?

The three cult members looked worried for a moment. They seemed to recognize the circle: whatever it did, it must be quite deadly. The leader screamed in fear, shielding his face with both arms, but nothing happened.

“What the fuck?” Heymans muttered under his breath.

Sweating, he tried again: the circle lit once more, but nothing happened. The villagers exchanged a confused glance. One of them laughed.

“You’re too fat, you idiot,” the woman snorted. “Your flesh is deforming the circle! No way it’s going to work this way.”

Heymans suddenly blushed heavily. Jean’s heart skipped a beat. He knew that look – it meant his friend didn’t have a plan B. They were screwed.

The leader clapped his own hands, and turned the nearby walls into restraints, forcing Heymans to fall to his knees, pinned to the ground.

“Well, that was surprisingly easy,” the woman commented. “What do we do with him boss? He would make a good sacrifice, that one. We’d be blessed for years with all that flesh.”

 _Sacrifice?_ Jean thought in panic.

He struggled to get loose, but couldn’t break the restraints that bound him. He was sweating as he realized how badly he had underestimated the cult. If they were ready to murder people for their beliefs, then the situation was much worse than he had previously thought.

“I think we should do that, yes,” the leader agreed. “Jerry, why don’t you tell the others to get a fire ready?”

“Hold on boss,” Jerry said. “How about we have a bit of fun with this one first? It’s obvious he’s completely defenseless.”

The leader seemed to ponder this suggestion for a moment. Heymans’ belly chose this moment to rumble. The leader’s lips curved into a smile.

“Oh yes. Let’s have a bit of fun with the pig, right here, right now.”

“Serves him right for trying to stop us,” the woman added.

Jean watched in horror as the leader picked a slice of cake from a nearby table, bringing it to Heymans, who was already salivating.

“Looks like our pig is hungry,” he said softly. “Would he like a snack?”

Heymans had enough dignity to not say anything, but his eyes were begging. The leader bit into the cake, just a few inches from his mouth.

“Please,” Heymans muttered.

The leader laughed.

“I can’t believe it!” Jerry said. “Now he’s begging us!”

“How undignified,” the woman added in obvious delight.

The leader pushed the cake inside Heyman’s mouth, who moaned with pleasure as he chewed it as slowly as he could.

“He’s eating from your hand boss,” Jerry said with a chuckle. “It could be poisoned and he wouldn’t even care.”

“Indeed, he wouldn’t.”

The leader groped Heymans’ body firmly, making the man wince. Jean protested mentally at the abuse, but couldn’t utter a single word.

_You have no right! It’s my job to feed him, to touch his belly and feel his rolls, get away from him!_

But of course, the leader couldn’t hear Jean’s thoughts, and even if he could, he wouldn’t have cared.

“Let’s see how far we can push this,” he decided. “Jerry, gather some food on the rug.”

“On the rug?” Jerry repeated.

“Yes, or anywhere on the floor. Maybe use a crate of some sort, it doesn’t matter.”

The leader turned back his attention toward Heymans.

“You’re still hungry, aren’t you?”

Heymans nodded, undaring to speak.

“And you would do anything to eat more?”

Heymans nodded once again, his eyes clearly begging.

“Well then, let’s not make you wait. Anne, tie his hands behind his back, why don’t you?”

Anne did as she was told. She moved quickly and silently, grabbing Heymans’ wrists and binding them together with a thick rope. She was probably the person who had bound Jean too, he reflected.

“There you go boss,” she said.

“I’m done too,” Jerry added.

“Very well,” the leader said with a smile. “The food is all yours, copper. The only rule is that you’re not allowed to use your hands.”

Jean tried to dissuade Heymans from going, but he couldn’t even meet his gaze. Heymans was so eager to eat that it was painful to watch. He walked to the corner of the room as was as he could, fell on his knees, then threw his face inside the crate, and began to chew as fast as he could. It was disgusting, raw and feral. His face was stained with cream and sugar, and he didn’t seem to care, the only thing that mattered was to shove as much food down his throat as he could. The villagers were laughing at him, at his eagerness to stuff his face, at his ridiculous posture which placed his butt higher than his face, at the noises he made as he ate. Jerry even walked around to place himself behind Heymans, caressing his love handles with one finger, then groping at them with a lusty expression.

“What are you doing?” The leader asked severely.

“Dunno, I thought I could have some fun,” Jerry replied, almost lying down on Heymans as he moved his hands around to grope his belly more firmly. “I admit, I have a thing for fat guys.”

Heymans chose this moment to fart in his face, but Jerry hardly seemed to mind. On the contrary, he took a moment to smell the stinky air around him, smiling in delight.

“You can touch him a bit if you like,” the leader conceded. “But don’t rape him, got it? We can’t soil our sacrifices, or they’re worth nothing.”

“Of course boss.”

Jean was so angry that he bruised his wrists by trying to free them, but no matter how much strength he inputted in his arms, he couldn’t break the rope. He was in agony as he watched his best friend made into a show for these sadistic assholes, and seeing Jerry taking so much pleasure in groping his flesh made him enraged.

Heymans seemed to be beyond all that. He kept eating, consuming the absurd amount of food he had been given without a care in the world, his uniform growing tighter with each passing second.

Then suddenly he stopped. Jean wondered if he had eaten everything, but no, there seemed to be some food left in the crate. So why had he stopped so suddenly? Had he finally managed to control himself?

The cult members looked as puzzled as he did. Heymans got back to his feet awkwardly, and faced them. His face was still covered in food, which made him look like a clown. But behind the blush, sweat and ridicule, there was a calm expression which stunned every person in the room, including Jean. Heymans wasn’t scared anymore.

“Never tried to draw a circle with my mouth before,” he said as he licked his lips. “It’s harder than it looks, but quite simple when you have as much training as I do.”

Then he clapped his hands (though they were still tied behind his back). It was a very weak clap, it barely made a sound. It was enough to light the circle that Heymans had dug at the bottom of the food crate – and suddenly half of the cave collapsed on itself.

Jean thought he was going to die. But the next minute Heymans was calmly severing the rope that bound him, having previously wiped his face with the cult leader’s shirt (who had been knocked out by a falling rock).

“How the hell-” Jean began, breathless.

The cave had been wrecked by the raw power of Heymans’ alchemy, nearly burying the three cult members with it. Heymans himself however, was mostly untouched, and Jean hadn’t even been grazed.

“Are they dead?” Was the only thing Jean found himself capable of saying.

“Thankfully not, or this would have been another tragic tale of police brutality. Because I’ll be honest, I didn’t have full control over that spell, and I wasn’t even sure it would work the way I wanted. But the three of them are breathing. I called an ambulance, they should be here soon.”

“But how...”

Jean got up from his chair, and looked down inside the food crate. Heymans had eaten everything that was placed in the middle of it, then used a plate to draw a perfect circle with custard cream (which he must have spit out, Jean had to guess). Then he had drawn an awkward triangle at the center, using the same method.

“That _worked?”_ Jean asked in astonishment.

“Well, I’ve been studying the question in my free time,” Heymans admitted. “I always wondered if the circles that alchemists use had to be systematically drawn, or if something else could be used, like sculpture for instance. The books never mention alchemy being used this way, but it never says that it’s impossible either. I eventually realized that nobody’s even thought of it.”

“Who else but you would think of drawing a magic circle with custard?” Jean asked with a hollow chuckle. “You’re a genius.”

“More like a fool. This whole mission is a disaster.”

Heymans dug through Anne’s pocket, and found a piece of chalk.

“Let’s confront the rest of them now, shall we? And if they want to resist, I’ll use this, instead of trying to show off with stupid belly tattoos.”

Heymans was walking out of the cave. Jean followed him uncertainly.

“Wait,” he eventually said.

“What is it?”

Heymans turned around, a curious expression on his face. Jean threw himself in his arms and hugged him tightly. He was trembling a little.

“How can you act so casual after what happened? After what these people did to you?”

“Well-”

“You scared me a lot. I thought we were doomed.”

Jean felt himself being hugged back. Now pressed closely to Heymans, he could smell the sweat that had been pouring from his body, and the fear that came with it.

“I’m sorry,” Heymans said. “I should have protected you better.”

“You should have protected yourself better,” Jean corrected.

“I promise you that I’ll be more careful.”

Jean unwrapped himself from his friend’s body and wiped his eyes.

“Still… that was very cool, how you wrecked them at the end. They didn’t see a thing coming.”

Heymans smiled, and it was probably the purest, most heartfelt smile Jean had seen since they had reunited all those months ago.

The rest of the mission went smoothly. Most of the remaining cult members gave up without a fight, and Heymans managed to disable the remaining ones without hurting them. Jean was surprised to find a few of his customers among them: to think these people that he met every day actually conspired to sacrifice people to some unknown god, right under his nose, flipped his world upside down. He took the time to sit and talk with some of them, waiting for the rest of the police force to arrive. He needed answers, he needed to understand what could drive someone to do something like this.

The answers shook him. These people had been alone and scared. They had a power that they couldn’t control, which scared their friends and families, that they were told to hide and repress. They had been cast out, rejected, sometimes abused. The cult had approached them individually, they had offered teaching, they had preached love and mutual understanding. How could anyone refuse?

When the police arrived, they praised Heymans for his work, though there seemed to be a hint of sarcasm in their words. He helped them capture the most hostile cult members, then hitched one of their rides to meet his superiors at HQ and make his report. Jean watched as the row of black cars rode down the mountain, soon followed by the remaining villagers. He eventually found himself alone in the woods, night progressively falling on the scene. He knew that he was supposed to go home, but somehow he couldn’t. So he lied down in the grass, closed his eyes, and eventually fell asleep.


	10. Getting fired

Jean woke up several hours later, in the dead of night. It was raining, and he was shivering. He ran home as fast as he could, and checked himself in the mirror. He looked like death, he was dirty, bruised and tired. His wound had been treated by the police when they had arrived, but he decided to have a shower, then change his bandage. After that, he went to bed. The next morning he opened his restaurant like he always did, but didn’t chat with his clients as much as he usually liked to. He was lost in thoughts. People asked him what had happened to him, but his replies were incredibly vague. Fuery came later to interview him regarding the events from yesterday, and he gave him a detailed account of what he remembered – but the story was flat, devoid of any emotions, like he were reading a list of names. Fuery wrote everything down, but was shocked to see his friend so down.

“What’s going on with you? Do you want to talk about it?”

“It’s nothing, I’m just tired. Don’t bother yourself with me.”

It was only during the late afternoon that Heymans came, smiling like a proud man. He was wearing clothes which actually fit him for once, which was incredible, judging from his girth. It was a white shirt with vertical blue stripes, a tuxedo vest and dark pants. His tie was the same color as his hair.

“Oh, there you are,” Jean found himself saying stupidly.

“Indeed, I came to check on you. How are you doing, Jean?”

“I’ve been better, I won’t lie. What about you? Those are some very fancy clothes, you’re invited to a wedding?”

“Oh no, I’m not. It’s just that I have an appointment with my boss tomorrow, so I need to look nice.”

“It looks amazing on you,” Jean said in admiration (though in truth it wasn’t the clothes themselves he admired, but how they clung tightly to Heymans’ frame).

“Thanks. I also came to say goodbye.”

There was a moment of silence, not because Jean didn’t know what to reply, but because it took him a while to fully grasp the meaning of those simple words.

“What?” He said weakly.

“Do you remember the first day I came into your restaurant? The day I introduced myself as Don? The day I ate with reckless abandon before waddling out like a drunk man? Well on that day, I had just had a meeting with my boss. She was concerned about my recent weight gain, you see. She gave me a warning, back then: I had four months to lose at least half my weight, or I’d lose my current position. Tomorrow, she’s here to see my progress: and since I’m probably thrice the size I used to be, you can probably tell how well this is going to go.”

“But… but I don’t understand,” Jean argued weakly. “You can still do your job just fine, why does it matter how big you are?”

“You pointed it out to me: I can’t fight anymore. This isn’t normal for a cop. It’s much harder to be discreet too, when you’re as big as me, and investigating requires to blend in with the crowds pretty often. Let’s face it, I’m not the man I used to be. If I were my own boss, I’d probably fire myself too.”

“But why… but why would you have to say goodbye? Don’t you like it here?”

“They’ll assign me another job, something that doesn’t require any qualifications. Probably some tedious office job, like reading through reports and filing them. On the side, I’ll be forced to exercise and have a diet – that’s the deal if I want my old job back. Maybe in ten years I’ll eventually have it, who knows.”

“But...”

“It’s okay Jean. I’ll try to visit you every now and then, on my free time. I won’t have any week-ends, but maybe I’ll be allowed some holidays, maybe once a year.”

Jean felt horrible. It was his fault if Heymans was getting away. It was his fault for overfeeding him, because of that the poor man had lost his job, and his reputation.

“I’m sorry,” Jean said, feeling the tears welling up in his eyes. “It’s all my fault.”

“Of course not. I brought this to myself, and you know it.”

He smiled.

“Come on Jean, cheer up. This is my last evening with you, and I intend to enjoy it, okay? I’m going to allow myself one last big meal before my diet starts. Make it count,” he added with a wink.

Jean needed a moment to himself.. He asked Heymans if he could wait, and the bigger man replied that he was fine with it as long as he had some bread to chew in the meantime. Jean gave him a baguette, and retreated in his kitchen. He sat on a stool and sighed in defeat. He tried to picture his life without Heymans, telling himself that it would be like going back in time. He had spent ten years without even seeing his friend once, so surely he could get used to it again, right?

But his old life, which had seemed so simple and perfect before, now felt like a nightmare to him, gray and hollow, empty of everything that made it fulfilling. It would be completely meaningless to get up every day to feed all these people that were not Heymans, to smile at these customers who were not Heymans, before going to bed without Heymans-

 _You’re totally in love with him,_ said in voice in his head.

“Yeah no shit,” Jean said out loud, snorting through his tears.

“Hm? What was that?”

Jean turned around. Heymans was standing in the entrance, looking politely confused.

“Oh, nothing, I was just talking to myself,” Jean mumbled, quickly wiping his eyes. “What are you doing here? Are you hungry already?”

“Oh, I’m fine, it’s just that your other customers are beginning to wonder what’s going on. It’s been an hour, and you haven’t come out even once, so I offered to check on you.”

Heymans chuckled.

“I think they mistook me for a waiter.”

“I don’t have a waiter anymore,” Jean said, sniffling. “She left the village a month ago, and now I’m the only one who works here.”

“Well, I can always help if you need me to. It’d only be natural after all you’ve done for me. If I recall, this old lady at table seven ordered fish stew, it was nearly forty-five minutes ago and she’s getting a little angry about it. Should we start with that?”

Jean got up from his stool wearily, and nodded. He got to work, giving Heymans basic instructions, mechanically. He was relying on pure habit, but the pleasure of cooking had completely left him.

“Fish stew,” he was muttering to himself. “What kind of a person orders fish stew for dinner?”

“I could go for some fish stew,” Heymans commented in a matter-of-a-fact voice. “But I could go for anything, honestly.”

Once they were done, Jean handed Heymans the plate.

“I have to begin working on my other orders, you don’t mind doing the deliveries for a bit?”

“Of course not. Seeya soon.”

Heymans kissed him on the cheek and left with the plate. Jean smiled and blushed, then began to work on another order.

“There we go,” Heymans said when he came back a little while later. “I apologized on your behalf, and we talked for a bit. Your customers are very curious people.”

“They’re used to chatting with me. That’s part of what makes this place attractive, I guess. Usually I love to talk with people, that’s part of why they come back.”

“I see! Well I’ll keep talking to people then. It’s nice to get to know them.”

When Jean was done with his second order (two plates of bacon and fries), he gave Heymans the tray, and stood at the kitchen’s entrance to watch him working. Heymans didn’t hesitate: he knew right away who the plates belonged to. It was comical to see him bend his legs to place the plates on the table instead of his back, which he couldn’t bend because his belly would get in the way. It was also a little endearing. The young couple seemed delighted, and the man asked Heymans for had long he had been a waiter. Heymans explained politely that it was his first day at the job, and that he hoped he was doing okay.

People really seemed to love him. When Jean did the service, it was usually him who started the conversations, and not the other way around – but his customers were naturally curious about Heymans, and had all sorts of questions for him. Perhaps it was because he was new here, perhaps it was the slight Spanish accent, perhaps it was because he had this casual refinement about himself that was typical of people who lived in the city, perhaps it was his clothing, or simply his weight, or maybe all these things at once. Whichever the case, it was a heartwarming sight. There was nothing mean about all these interrogations, nothing vicious about their curiosity. And Heymans obviously enjoyed the attention he was getting.

“It’s like you’ve done this your whole life,” Jean said in admiration when Heymans came back into the kitchen.

“I’m proud of myself if my performances made you smile. Still, it’s very hard watching all these people eat and not being able to grab a bite for myself. I’m trying to deliver the plates without looking too hungry, but I think it’s kinda obvious. The woman from table three gave me a handful of fries, and I couldn’t say no to her,” he added in embarrassment.

“Well, why don’t you grab a fruit then?” Jean suggested, pointing to a little basket which was placed on top of the fridge. “The next order won’t be in a while, so make yourself comfy.”

And so the evening went. Once all the customers had finally left, Jean took a seat in the main room after closing the front door, and let out a heavy sigh.

“Your day is not over yet,” Heymans teased. “You still have this big tub of lard to feed, and he’s getting hungrier by the second.”

“Just a moment,” Jean pleaded.

His eyes remained fixed on the wooden ceiling. He knew what he had to say, but he didn’t know if he would actually dare to speak out loud. After all, it was quite a bold request, and if Heymans didn’t like the idea, it might ruin the last evening he could spend with him. Could he really afford to take the risk?

“I...” He began uncertainly.

“Yes?”

“Heymans, do you… uh… can I hire you?”

“What?”

“As you already know, I need a new waiter, and it turns out you’re damn good at the job. Besides, people seem to like you. I know you’ve been treating this whole thing as a joke, but you really have a talent, don’t you think it’d be a wasted to throw it away?”

“Uh… this is quite sudden, I don’t really know.”

“I wouldn’t force you to go through a diet,” he added, almost pleadingly. “You could eat as much as you want, I’d never tell you to stop, never tell you that you’re too fat for the job.”

“Even if I end up being too fat to fit through the door?” Heymans asked amusingly.

“I’d make a larger door for you if it came to that!”

Jean was standing up at this point, he was flailing his arms as he spoke, looking a little like a broken puppet.

“You wouldn’t even need to work every day. I could leave you some time to do investigation around the place, even some holidays if you needed them, and we could make trips to the city every now and then. But please, just… don’t leave me.”

Jean fell in Heymans’ arms, almost accidentally, surprised to be cushioned by his soft flesh. Heymans patted his back.

“I’ll think about it,” he promised with a smile. “It’s definitely appealing, but you can’t expect me to take a decision like that in five minutes, okay?”

“Of course. Sorry.”

“It’s fine. I love you too.”

Jean blushed again, and retreated inside the kitchen once more. He was too overwhelmed to say another word.


	11. Final Night

Jean came out of the kitchen, carrying a tray with five plates on it, which he put on the table where Heymans was sitting. Four of the plates contained a massive hamburger (each a different kind), the last one was a simple order of fries. Jean noticed that Heymans had already opened the window.

_He knows himself well._

“There’s more in the kitchen, but I couldn’t bring you everything at once,” Jean explained, almost apologetically. “Go ahead, don’t hesitate! Dig in.”

“You want to make me burst out of my new clothes?” Heymans asked in amusement.

“Who knows. If it happens, let’s just say I won’t be complaining.”

Heymans ate rather slowly, for once. Jean stood on a nearby table to watch him, eating a little omelet on the side (which was, he realized with a touch of guilt, his first meal of the day).

“Delicious,” Heymans commented, already moaning in pleasure. “You’re getting better at this.”

To Jean’s surprise, he was using a knife and a fork, rather than directly biting into the burger like he would usually have. Perhaps it was to show Jean that he appreciated his food a lot more than before – or perhaps he had gotten better at controlling his hunger.

But slow or not, Heymans ate everything. The four burgers were wiped out, including the bread crumbs, along with the fries, and three milkshakes to help it go down.

“You didn’t go easy on the sugar, did you?” Heymans asked in slight unease.

“Obviously not. Don’t pretend you don’t like it.”

Heymans didn’t reply, and began to eat his fifth burger. Jean went back inside his kitchen to make more food.

 _Why did I give him milkshakes?_ He thought deviously. _I should have gone for a sparkling drink. See how his stomach handles all that gas._

When he came back later, Heymans was halfway through the second order of burgers. He had already untied his belt and removed his tuxedo vest to give his belly some extra room, but it was already straining the fabric.

“Still enjoying yourself?” Jean asked nicely.

“Indeed. What is it you’re bringing me this time?”

“A cake! Just for you.”

“Just for me, huh?”

Heymans eyed Jean’s creation. It was a pretty big cake, which would have normally been enough to feed ten people. His eyes flashed with greed and gluttony, and he smiled in appreciation.

“I guess I could make room in my stomach for this little thing,” he commented.

“Confident, are we?”

“Of course.”

_In a moment I’ll have you panting and begging, you’ll see._

Jean sat once again on one of his tables, watching Heymans eat. He was going a little faster by now, shoving the food in his mouth a little more brutally. His belly was making loud noises: clearly, it was asking for more.

He shoved the first bight of cake into his mouth, letting out a cry of surprise.

“Wow, it’s delicious!”

 _I have you,_ Jean thought.

Heymans ate the cake with visible content, though it seemed to be getting a little difficult for him at this point. He was beginning to sweat, and the buttons on his shirt were threatening to burst. He seemed to have a hard time bending forward, and sometimes as he ate, he would be massaging his belly with the other hand.

“You’ve gotten better at this,” Jean appreciated.

Heymans blushed in happiness and kept eating. He seemed to be determined to keep his dignity this time: he didn’t stain himself, he didn’t fart, he didn’t throw himself at the food like a starved man.

_Yet._

Jean brought him another cake, even bigger than the first one, while Heymans had barely finished the first. He let out a tiny squeak: clearly, though his gluttony urged him to eat it right away, the rest of his body seemed ready to quit.

“If that’s too much for you I can take it away,” Jean said with faux concern.

“No no, I can eat it,” Heymans said hastily. “I just need a moment.”

Heymans finished the first cake, then leaned back on his chair, massaging his belly slowly. He stifled a belch.

“Okay, let’s go.”

He bent his body forward, cutting a first slice of the cake, but his shirt didn’t resist the pressure, and one of his buttons popped.

“Oops,” he said as he was filling his plate. “Guess I’ll have to resew that.”

“Indeed,” Jean said with a smile. “It would look bad if you met your boss like that tomorrow, wouldn’t it?”

“Hmf.”

Heymans kept eating. Apparently tired of bending forward to grab a new slice each time, he got up from his chair, and ate standing up. Another of his buttons popped out, and the sound of something tearing was heard coming from his backside.

“What happened?” He asked in confusion. “I can’t see.”

“It’s your pants, they ripped on the side,” Jean explained with a smirk.

“Oh. I guess I’ll have to work on those too.”

He seemed a little worried, but he kept eating. His belly seemed to be expanding with each new bite, but he was apparently very determined to finish everything. However, whenever he would finish a dish, Jean would have a new one ready for him. Heymans never backed down from the challenge, but he seemed to be losing his confidence.

“It’s the last one, isn’t it?” He would be asking in worry.

“I’m not forcing you to eat anything. I just don’t want you to go hungry.”

“I’ll stop eating after this one.”

And each time, Heymans would break his promise, and eat another helping.

After about half an hour, he began to lose control. He was eating much faster and cared much less about being clean. His shirt had several stains (only two of the buttons still remained by that point). He had begun to let out little farts, every now and then.

“The diet is going to be fun, isn’t it?” Jean teased.

“Sh-shut up.”

“Look at you go. Poor hungry boy. Here’s another plate for you.”

Heymans’ pants were completely ripped: they barely clung to his frame through a few loose threads, but soon they’d give out like the rest. His shirt was in no better state: it still clung to his moobs and arms, but was ripped everywhere else. Only his speedo seemed to hold pretty well, proudly covering the top of his butt, clinging to his frame like a tattoo.

Heymans kept eating, but his legs were getting weak. Jean helped him sit on the floor, and fed him directly. From this point and on, it was much faster and much easier. Heymans would sometimes scream, but whenever he released a fart, he would feel better.

“C’mon, we’re almost there,” Jean would encourage him. “You still haven’t ripped out of your underwear, gordo, that means you haven’t eaten enough.”

“But… tomorrow…”

His words were cut by a loud belch.

“I’m not forcing you to eat anything,” Jean said with a shrug. “If you don’t want that slice of cake, then I guess it’s all for me.”

“No no, wait, hold on-”

Heymans tried to get up to grab it, but he seemed to be having some difficulty. He tried to put his hands on the floor, but his legs seemed too weak to lift his body up. However, Jean was already standing, and taking a few steps backwards in the room. Panting and sweating, Heymans managed to get to his feet, and clumsily waddled toward him. Jean lifted the cake near his face slowly, opening his mouth-

Heymans ran into him, accidentally pinning him to the wall. The impact made him fart and moan simultaneously. Jean on the other hand was so shocked that he dropped the slice of cake, which fell on the floor near his feet.

But the cake no longer mattered. Heymans’ face was only a few inches from his, Jean could smell his sugary breath, gaze at his confused little eyes, see his drooling mouth. He was drowning in the fatter man’s flesh, Heymans’ large moobs were crushed against his torso, his belly almost swallowed him whole.

“Sorry,” Heymans mumbled. “I just thought-”

Jean put a hand on his mouth to silence him. Then he carefully brought his face closer. Finally understanding what was going on, Heymans leaned forward in return to kiss him.

It was a pure moment, but it didn’t last. As soon as their lips parted, Heymans farted again.

“My bad,” he said, blushing. “I uh… sorry.”

Hey placed his hands against the wall behind Jean, and pulled himself backwards.

“More food?” Jean asked.

“More food.”

Jean wasn’t trying to conceal his boner at that point. When he brought the next tray, he had removed his top. He fed Heymans for three consecutive hours, until only his underwear remained intact. By this point the man had inflated so much that his belly nearly touched the floor when he stood up, while retaining its round shape. The only thing that kept him balanced when he stood was the increased size of his butt cheeks, both larger than beach balls, constantly shaken with newly released gas. His moobs were so large that his face almost seemed to drown in them, and Jean had to climb onto him if he wanted to reach his mouth.

“More,” was all Heymans could moan. “I need… more- hmppf.”

“Eat,” was all Jean would reply, as he shoved the next bite into his mouth.

“Aaaah,” Heymans moaned. “I’m so… huh… so fat… hmmpff!”

“Come on, we’re almost there,” Jean replied softly. “Almost there. I’m sure your underwear will burst soon enough.”

“More, more… ummmpf.”

Heymans was hurting, his stomach would constantly make strange noises as it tried to digest the absurd amount of food it was given. His speedo was getting tighter with each passing second, mercilessly crushing his erect penis, lost under mountains of fat flesh.

But eventually, it finally ripped. First a little hole appeared in the middle, then it connected to the top, and the whole fabric snapped, finally setting Heymans free.

“There you go!” Jean said in delight. “You actually did it!”

“Urgh… so fat,” Jean mumbled.

“Time to take good care of you, my love.”

A full belly massage was in order (which, judging from the size of said belly, had to take a while). Next followed a trip to the bathroom (Jean had to help Heymans walk, and pushing him through the door took a lot of work). Lastly came the nightly sex – none of the men could hold themselves back any longer. Jean began softly by exploring each aspect of Heymans’ newly expanded body: the folds under his moobs, the creases near his belly button, the rolls under his armpits, his thighs, hands, and absurdly round love handles. Next he placed his left nipple in his mouth, and sucked it like a newborn baby, earning very loud moans from his partner.

“But how will I find your dick under all that flesh?” Jean teased when he was done.

Heymans blushed, attempted to fold his arms in a pout, but found that his moobs got in the way. With a little help from Jean, they managed to get him to stand up again.

“Now, don’t move,” Jean warned. “I’m going to crawl under your belly, and then I’ll try to reach your dick.”

“Be quick,” Heymans begged. “I’ve been hard for too long, I can’t hold myself much longer!”

Jean dived under Heymans’ belly, appreciating its size from under. Then he moved to kneel between his legs, pushing the fat rolls aside so he could reach the penis, and put it in his mouth. It was a strange situation, because it felt like he had walked inside a dark cave. He could barely seen anything, and was surrounded by fat coming from every angle.

_And that’s how Heymans feels all the time? How lucky._

Later, Heymans would be ashamed of how quick it went. He was barely able to hold it for more than a minute, before he exploded inside Jean’s mouth. But after the events of the evening, Jean could hardly blame him.

After that, Heymans sat again, and Jean climbed onto his belly to lie down near his face.

“We did it,” Heymans whispered in disbelief. “I can’t believe that just happened.”

“I loved it,” Jean replied shamelessly.

“… yeah, same,” Heymans admitted.

There was a short moment of silence.

“I’m going to miss my appointment,” Heymans added stupidly. “I can’t leave the village without any clothes, and I doubt you have anything that’d fit me now. Not to mention, I don’t know if I wouldn’t get stuck in the bus door.”

“You’re still thinking about that?”

“Well… yeah, you’re right, that’s a little silly. But what will I do now?”

“My offer still stands.”

“What? You think I could work for you in that state?”

“Sure thing. You can still walk, right? I’ll have someone take your measurements and buy you a new uniform. I’ll make the kitchen door wider and I’ll add some extra space between the tables. It’ll be a little tough for you, but I’m sure you’ll manage.”

“I guess,” Heymans said with a chuckle. “We’ll see about that.”

Jean crawled forward to kiss him again. Afterwards, he rested his head between the two cushions that formed his moobs, and fell asleep. Tomorrow, he would hire the fattest man in the world to be his waiter, and life would follow a strange course for him – but he wouldn’t want it any other way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The end! I hope you enjoyed that little fic. I definitely enjoyed writing it. What did you think of it? Don't hesitate to leave a comment to share your thoughts!


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